Consumers’ League drags Orange, MTN, ART to Court

The Cameroon Consumers’ League has dragged two mobile telephone service providers; Orange Cameroon and MTN Cameroon to court over what it termed “poor treatment and extortion of consumers” with the propagation of a 4G network that doesn’t in the country.

The country’s Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (ART) was also sued for failing on its part to sanction the operators.

We learned the case comes up for hearing on January 28, at the Yaounde Magistrate Court.

According to the suit, the Cameroon Consumers’ League is asking the court “to examine and consider that since December 16, 2015, a deceptive publicity of the 4G is being circulated by Orange and MTN, under the watchful eyes and complicity of ART.”

They want the court to cause the institutions to pay damages, considering that Cameroonian consumers have spent huge sums of money to acquire a service that doesn’t exist.

It should be noted that on January 7, the Regulatory Agency dismissed any existence of the 4G network as being advertised by the telephone service providers in the country.

In an official statement signed by ART’s general manager, Jean Louis Beh Mengue, the telecommunications regulator told consumers that although operators were advertising it, 4G was not yet available in Cameroon.

The communiqué made clear that the connection speeds offered by MTN and Orange did not meet 4G requirements.

Part of the ART statement read: “Some network operators have launched major communication campaigns announcing they were now offering 4G in Cameroon.

The Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (ART) would like to underline that 4G consists in a set of systems that provide mobile telecommunications services worldwide regardless of location, network or terminal equipment used. These systems offer access to the most advanced telecommunications services of the moment.

Said mobile services are considered “very high speed”, with theoretical speeds above 100 Megabits per second. In practice, these rates are generally lower than this value.”

The statement summarily exposed the falsehood in Orange and MTN promotions, hence the Consumers’’ League petition for compensation.