Follow Us on Google
From Sola Ojo, Abuja
A Senior Software Engineer at Oracle, Mr. Sheriff Adepoju, has cautioned that Nigeria’s planned N12.4 billion fine on telecom operators over poor service delivery may not translate into improved user experience without deliberate investment in recovery engineering.
Adepoju made this known in Abuja while reacting to the decision by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to sanction operators for breaches of service standards.
The commission also disclosed ongoing efforts to strengthen its enforcement mechanisms to ensure greater compliance.
The move followed a directive by the Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Bosun Tijani, mandating the NCC to introduce automatic penalties for network failures within 90 days, aimed at tightening accountability in the sector.
However, Adepoju stressed that while penalties may punish operators after service failures, they do not inherently improve the systems required to resolve such failures faster.
He identified recovery engineering, the structured process of restoring services quickly and efficiently after disruptions as the critical missing link.
To him, telecom networks are routinely affected by fibre cuts, power outages, equipment faults, software glitches, and congestion during peak periods.
“Without strong recovery systems, these disruptions often lead to prolonged outages and poor customer experience.
Other News
“Recovery engineering is the combination of tools, processes, and trained responses that ensure disruptions are detected early, assigned promptly, resolved safely, and clearly communicated to users,” he explained.
He noted that in the absence of such systems, customers are left in frustrating cycles of repeated service failures, vague timelines, and ineffective customer support.
Citing recent data from the NCC, Adepoju highlighted the rapid growth in telecom demand, with monthly mobile data usage rising from about 518,000 terabytes in January 2023 to over 1.23 million terabytes by November 2025.
Broadband subscriptions also climbed to approximately 109.6 million by December 2025, pushing penetration to 50.58 percent.
He warned that demand is outpacing operators’ ability to recover quickly from routine failures, meaning that service disruptions now have wider economic and social consequences as more Nigerians rely on mobile connectivity for work, education, and financial transactions.
Adepoju further outlined key elements of effective recovery engineering, including rapid fault detection, clear responsibility assignment, controlled system restoration, and proactive safeguards to prevent minor issues from escalating into prolonged outages.
He further emphasised that transparent customer communication must be integrated into the recovery process, not treated as an afterthought.
“Customers want honest updates and realistic timelines. That is only possible when communication is tied to actual recovery steps like detection, diagnosis, repair, and verification,” he said.
