Tribunal stops MultiChoice’s planned tariff hike

A Competition and Consumer Protection Tribunal (CCPT) sitting in Abuja has stopped the MultiChoice Nigeria Limited from going ahead with its plan to increase tariff on DStv and Gotv packages beginning from May 1, 2024.

The panel gave the order following an ex-parte motion moved by the counsel for the applicant, Ejiro Awaritoma.

The restraining order is to subsist pending the hearing and determination of the motion on notice filed before it.

Festus Onifade had dragged MultiChoice and the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) before the tribunal.

The tribunal had on Monday, April 29, stopped the MultiChoice from increasing its tariffs and cost of products and services scheduled to begin on May 1.

But Multichoice had refused service of the order.

The applicant, Festus Onifade, disclosed on Wednesday that the tribunal bailiff alleged that one of the company’s top managers at the Abuja office said the documents be channelled through their Lagos office, which is the headquarters.

The three-member tribunal presided over by Saratu Shafii, consequently granted a separate order to the applicant to serve its earlier order on the Abuja MultiChoice office through substituted service.

In the certified true copy of the order of substituted service, Shaffi directed that the ex-parte order in suit number: CCPT/OP/2/2024, be pasted at the corporate headquarters or any known address of the branches of MultiChoice Nigeria Limited across Nigeria.

She also ordered that the documents be sent to the company’s “known email address, social media handles and any means of communication publicly known for Multi-Choice and shall also be pasted in the CCPT communication outlet.

The documents have since been pasted at the MultiChoice, Abuja office located at Wuse II.

MultiChoice recently announced a price increment on its DStv and GOtv packages effective May 1.

The pay-TV company said the price hike was due to the cost of business operations in Nigeria.

The company had, on April 1, 2022, hike the prices of all its packages despite public outcry.