The big four telecoms operators in Nigeria that were sanctioned by Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) last month over poor quality of service "have agreed" to pay their N1.17billion fines this week, sources told Daily Trust yesterday.

The NCC might have waived the N2.5 million per day punitive fines slammed on them, MTN, Glo, Airtel and Etisalat for refusing to pay the N1.17 on the May 25 deadline.

A source at the NCC, who pleaded anonymity told Daily Trust that the decision of the commission to waive the default fines "was taken in the interest of the industry."

A spokesman of one of the sanctioned telecoms operators, who also pleaded anonymity, confirmed to our reporter that they (operators) may pay the fines to NCC this week.

The NCC had on May 11 ordered MTN Nigeria and Etisalat Nigeria to pay N360 million fines.

It also said Airtel Nigeria should pay N270 million while Globacom, Nigeria's second national operator (SNO), was ordered to pay N180million.

The mobile phone companies were also ordered to pay their respective fines not later than May 25 or risk a fresh round of punitive fines pegged at N2.5million per day if they default in meeting Friday's payment deadline.

In separate letters notifying the four affected GSM operators of the sanctions, jointly signed on behalf of the EVC by Head, Compliance Monitoring & Enforcement, U. A. S. Maska and Director, Legal & Regulatory Services, Josephine Amuwa, the regulator said they were penalized for failure to meet the Network Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in the months of March and April, 2012.