Etisalat slammed with a N10 Million Law Suit

Etisalat, one of Nigeria's Cellular phone service providers has been slammed with a N10 Million law suit for illegally swapping a subscriber's active number without his consent.

Taiwo Egbon, an Etisalat subscriber claim that he woke up one morning and discovered his Etisalat line which he uses in communicating with family members who frequently sends him money from overseas had been cloned.

Out of curiosity, he called the number and discovered someone in Kaduna State had been taking his calls.

Egbon told Pointblanknews.com that after getting a confirmation from one Mr. Chima, a staff of Etisalat that his line was indeed swapped for “no just reason,” he filed a complaint through the Nigeria Communication Commission, (NCC) and Etisalat, but the cell phone company in its response simply told Egbon “we are not liable” in a letter in May 2010.

According to him “I received a response from the NCC through a letter dated August 20, 2010 and signed by one Mrs. Lolia Emakpore with an attached response from Etisalat and I was shocked that they lied to the NCC that I did the sim card swapping myself, that I authorized it on April 3, 2010.”

“It was a blatant lie. I loaded my phone with credit in my house and about to use it to call the University of East London where I have applied to do a post-graduate program and when the network keeps failing, I used another line to call my Etisalat number and someone else picked the phone claiming that he owns the number.”

 
Not satisfied with Etisalat game over the swapping of his number, Egbon proceeded to court, filing a law suit against the cell phone company. The ruling has been fixed for March 16, 2011 at the Federal High Court, Benin where Egbon is demanding N10 Million in damages.

Egon told Pointblanknews.com that he is particularly piqued because the Etisalat number was his main number which he uses to receive calls from relatives overseas and from Universities abroad .

When Pointblanknews.com contacted Etisalat by telephone, no one responded.