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.
