Court orders NCC, MTN, Airtel to pay N500m for blocking APC’s fundraiser

A federal high court in Lagos has mandated the Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC) to pay N500 million to the All Progressives Congress for suspending the party’s presidential campaign fundraising platform.

In a judgment on a fundamental human rights enforcement suit filed by APC, Justice Ibrahim Buba held that the NCC acted beyond its powers in suspending the fundraising platform of the APC, which was meant to generate funds to prosecute the presidential bid of the party.

NCC had ordered telecoms firms Etisalat, MTN, Glo, Airtel and Visafone to stop running the SMS Code platform 35350 created by APC to raise funds. Issuing the directive, NCC had warned the telecoms firms against running political promotions that would portray them as being partisan.

But Justice Buba condemned the directive, declaring it illegal, null and void. “The directive by the NCC to the telecoms firms is hereby struck out having been made without power and in contravention of the fundamental rights of the applicant (APC),” Buba ruled.

The judge also awarded “N500 million damages against the defendants jointly and severally”. The judge further dismissed the preliminary objections and counter affidavits filed against the suit by the defendants.

In the originating motion, the party had urged the court to award N25 billion damages against the defendants for violating fundamental rights of its members.

The party said it created a “premium SMS code 35350″ through which willing donors could contribute to its presidential campaign fund. Within hours of its creation, APC said it was getting about five messages of N100 each every minute.

A total of 5,400 messages were received, it said. However, in a letter dated January 19, NCC directed all telecoms service providers “to avoid running political advertisements that will portray them as being partisan”.

 It threatened that it would not “hesitate to sanction any service provider that will flout this directive.” As a result, the mobile companies suspended the platform.

However, APC said other political parties had been using several media platforms to advertise, with none accused of being partisan. Besides, the applicant said NCC approved the short codes 6661, 662, 6663 and 6664 for the Goodluck-Sambo presidential campaign fundraising in 2010.

APC said since its platform was unjustly suspended, its members, supporters, sympathisers and others who wished to donate towards its presidential campaign had been “incapacitated”.

The party also said the code suspension inhibited its financial capacity to effectively prosecute its presidential campaign. It said NCC’s directive contravened it’s right to freedom of expression guaranteed under Section 39 of the 1999 Constitution.

 It further described the commission’s action as discriminatory.

“The purported directive of the first respondent (NCC) discriminated against the applicant’s (APC’s) members since the first respondent granted the approval for the use of short codes to raise funds for Goodluck-Sambo presidential campaign…,” APC said.