Grace Ashiru
On Wednesday, a significant service disruption affected millions of MTN Nigeria customers, rendering them unable to make calls or access the internet. The outage, lasting four hours, was attributed to multiple fiber cuts, as indicated by the company in an official statement.
The telecom company identified an issue in the afternoon that primarily impacted subscribers in Lagos.
“Our dedicated team of engineers is diligently working to address the issue, with services gradually being reinstated in certain regions,” shared Funso Aina, Senior Manager of External Relations at MTN Nigeria, in a statement to TechCabal.
“A fiber optic cable cut is the complete or partial severing of the thin glass fibers composing the cable,” explains a reliable source. These cables efficiently transmit data across vast distances by utilizing light pulses
One of the primary factors leading to fiber cuts in urban areas such as Lagos is due to road construction activities and deliberate acts of vandalism.
Fibre cuts pose a persistent challenge for telecom operators, leading to significant costs. Data from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) reveals that the industry allocated ₦14 billion to address approximately 59,000 fibre cuts between 2022 and 2023.
