The Nigerian Communications Commission has assigned 357.53 million new telephone numbers for the use of telecommunications operators.

The new telephones numbers were added in the third quarter of 2020 and belonged to about 32 licensed telecom operators, as contained in the NCC’s Q3 2020 National Numbering Plan.

The numbering plan released on Tuesday is used to allocate a unique National Number to each subscriber connected to the national telephone system.

Some of the operators with national and states licences, according to a document on NNP from NCC, are 101 Communications, 21st Century Technologies, Airtel Networks, Airworld Technologies, Alpha Technologies, Big Picture Nigeria, Broadbased Communications, CallMe Nigeria, Cedarview Communications, Cyberspace, EMTS Limited (9Mobile and FNL Engineering.

The states and cities where some of these telephone lines would be used by the operators include Lagos, Abuja, Enugu, Kano, Port Harcourt, Maiduguri, Owerri, Aba, Umuahia, Zaria, Jos, Awka, Umuahia, Uyo, Calabar, Ilorin, Kaduna and Kano, among others.

The numbering plan, according to NCC, provides a uniform dialling procedure for local calls, national long distance calls, international calls as well as calls to emergency and special services.

The commission in June had withdrawn 33.75 million telephone lines from some telecommunications operators who were licensees of the regulator.

It also returned 7.49 million telephone lines to Nigerian Telecommunications Limited and three other telecom operators.

Some of the defunct mobile operators whose phone lines were withdrawn included Cyancom Limited former MTS 1st Wireless Limited, ChromeComm Limited, GiCell Wireless Limited, Electronics Comms Incorporated, Mobitel Limited and M -TEL Communications Limited.

By Ife Ogunfuwa