James Rutherfoord, Nokia’s Vice President for West and Central Africa, has slammed the multitude of counterfeit and substandard mobile phones in Nigeria.
Rutherfoord complained the counterfeit mobile phones problem is a big “monster” that is difficult to tame in an interview with The Nation.
He added that Nokia is working with the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and mobile network operators to combat the problem and will launch a campaign aimed at educating its customers.
Rutherford said: “[The] presence of fake mobile phones is a big problem in Nigeria but we have employed [a] multi-pronged approach to it. One is to educate the consumer on all our materials. We put our warrant stickers on it and also give them a careline where they can send SMS to check if their phone is fake or not.
“We educate our partners and our dealers in the market. We have also, on more than one occasion, trained them and showed them how to differentiate the fake and genuine from the pack. So we have a number of initiatives against products in the market.”
Apart from working together with the NCS, Rutherfoord said Nokia is also working with the the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), which will help fight the counterfeit mobile phone problem through the registration of mobile devices.
