Etisalat Nigeria has announced a change of its brand name to 9Mobile.

This signals a final severance of all ties to the Etisalat group after the company in Nigeria was taken over by a consortium of financial institutions, following a failed $1.2 billion or N541 agreement.

The new name was announced at end of a management meeting of the company, which held on Thursday in Lagos.

Etisalat, Nigeria’s fourth largest telecommunication, has been shaken to its foundations by the failed debt agreement that led to the pulling out of the Mubadala Group, the highest investor in the company.

Mubadala, an Abu Dhabi-owned company, and Etisalat UAE mobile control 70 percent of the equity holding in Etisalat Nigeria, while Emerging Markets Telecommunications Services (EMTS), headed by Hakeem Bello-Osagie, former Chairman of the United Bank for Africa (UBA), controls the remaining 30 per cent.

The $1.2 billion loan was obtained by Etisalat Nigeria in order to finance a major network rehabilitation and expansion of its operational base in Nigeria, but following the economic recession that hit the country, the company was unable to keep up to its debt servicing agreements with its lenders.

A new board was appointed on July 4, to handle the takeover of the company by its new owners after a reallocation of shares, and Boye Olusanya, former Deputy Managing Director of Celtel Nigeria (now Airtel Nigeria), was appointed to head it.

However, few days later, Hatem Dowidar, Chief Executive of Etisalat International, made it clear that the group would no longer have anything to do with Etisalat Nigeria. He gave the company a three-week ultimatum to change its name.

“There’s a new board and we are not part of that company. We have sent our termination letter for the management agreement,” Dowidar said.

“Etisalat is among the top two in markets, such as the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Egypt and Afghanistan.

“(Nigerian) lenders may try to continue to operate the company until they find a buyer (or) they may merge the company with the existing players in Nigeria.

“The brand agreement in either of these two scenarios won’t be a long-term thing, so we take out the brand; in the long term Etisalat won’t be in Nigeria.”