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Friday, September 26, 2014

Telephone numbers to move from 8 to 9 digits



By Sylvanus Ezieh Acha’ana in Yaounde
 
Telephone numbers in Cameroon would switch from eight to nine digits as from November 21 this year, the minister of posts and telecommunications, Jean Pierre Biyiti Bi Essam has announced. Biyiti made the announcement on September 25 at a press briefing that held in La Falaise hotel in Yaounde.
Biyiti also used the press confab to announce the harmonization of the prefix of mobile telephone numbers in the country. According to the November modifications, all mobile telephone numbers including MTN, Orange and NEXTTEL would begin with 6 while all CAMTEL numbers would begin with 2.
In effect, to avoid any complicated procedures in the migration from eight to nine digits, subscribers of the three mobile telephone operators would simply have to add 6 at the beginning of all numbers while subscribers of CAMTEL would simply add 2 at the beginning of all CAMTEL numbers.
The move from eight to nine digits, according to the minister has been triggered by the increasing number of subscribers from about 8 million in 2007 to about 16 million today. The general motive for the organisational plan of the new look according to officials of the Telecommunications Regulatory board, ART is to reinforce clarity in the attribution of numbers for both telephone operators and subscribers.
It is the third time telephone numbers in Cameroon are witnessing a change in the number of figures. The first time the number of digits was increased was in 2001 when they moved from six to seven digits. Six years later that is in 2007 the number of subscribers increased, provoking the increase from seven to eight digits. The migration would incur no administrative procedures or financial cost, the minister assured.
Biyiti said with the coming of a new mobile operator, NEXTTEL, a subsidiary of VIETTEL, call cost could eventually reduce.

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