António Guterres, the United Nations secretary-general, has renewed his call to hold fossil fuel companies accountable by making them pay for the harm their actions have done to poorer countries through climate change, marking a defining moment of his last UN climate summit in office.

Mr Guterres gave his final press conference at the 31st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP31) in Antalya, Turkey, as the head of the organisation.

The former prime minister of Portugal has led the UN since January 2017 and exits the role on 31 December, when his second five-year term ends.

Mr Guterres addressed representatives of civil society groups, who gathered Friday to bid him farewell and recognised him with an award for using the UN’s platform to confront the world’s most powerful industries.

“You have given a voice to this injustice like no other leader,” Louise Hutchins, convener of the Make Polluters Pay International Coalition, said.

The session was filled with chants of “make polluters pay”, and speakers asked him to return to a future climate summit wearing an NGO badge.

Mr Guterres told the gathering that the UN’s loss and damage fund now exists but was “funded at a ridiculous level”.

“Those who pollute the least are those who are paying the highest price,” he said.

He urged civil society to apply the counter-pressure needed to help governments understand that things must change.

The UN chief’s final address to a COP leaders’ summit on Wednesday urged governments to levy a tax on oil companies’ windfall profits and use the money to help vulnerable countries recover.

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He also proposed a climate justice compact to help countries shift away from fossil fuels, noting that the climate crisis is outrunning the world.

Mr Guterres told the leaders he will no longer be secretary-general from next year, but said, “I will not stop telling the truth.”

At Friday’s press conference, he demanded an immediate and drastic cut in emissions by big emitters.

“You cannot build peace on a burning planet,” he said.

Mr Guterres’ successor has not been announced. The new secretary-general will take office on 1 January 2027 and will lead the UN into the next climate summit (COP32) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, later that year.

Kel Armstrong Amobi, host of the KaaTruths Podcast, said he vowed to take MTN Nigeria and other telecommunications operators to court over an alleged disappearance of more than 150GB of his mobile data.

Mr Amobi, popularly known as KAA, disclosed this in a post on X on Saturday, accusing MTN of failing to provide a satisfactory explanation of the incident, despite holding two telephone conversations with the company’s customer service representatives.

Mr Amobi said he and other parties will meet MTN and other telecommunications operators at the Federal High Court in Abuja on 18 November over the mysterious data disappearance.

According to him, about three weeks ago, he complained to MTN that more than 150GB vanished from his line, including the depletion of 20GB from his data balance within eight minutes, even though his mobile data was switched off at the time.

“Within minutes of making that post, @MTNNG replied publicly. They said they had investigated and that I actually used the data. They said this without even knowing which number was affected,” Mr Amobi stated.

The podcast host said MTN subsequently contacted him privately through X and requested to have a telephone conversation with him.

“On the call, a customer service agent apologised when I asked why they had lied publicly about an investigation that never happened. Then we got to the real issue. She admitted she had no answers. She said she would send the case to their technical team and call me back, he stated.

Mr Amobi said the representative later called back with the outcome of the investigation, claiming that he had used 30GB on Google services and another 19GB on YouTube on the day in question.

Mr Amobi, however, disputed the claim, particularly the assertion that he consumed the 19GB on YouTube while attending a meeting at Transcorp Hilton Abuja.
The customer care officer could not give a convincing response to what happened to the remaining data, he noted.

“But let’s take it even further, according to my phone records. The iPhone 17 Pro Max eSIM has a 5,088 mAh battery capacity, and at 95 per cent battery health, it would take about 25-30 per cent to stream a 4K Video on YouTube for three hours. Still, on that day, my battery usage records showed that YouTube used only 2% of Battery and spent about 20 minutes of screen time,” he remarked.

He also claimed that his iPhone’s records showed total YouTube data consumption of 23.8GB over the 10 months he had used the device, making MTN’s insistence that he used 19GB on YouTube in one day questionable.

According to him, MTN’s explanation did not account for the remaining data or establish how the alleged consumption occurred while his mobile data was switched off.
The podcast host said he would not blame the customer service representative, describing her as an employee carrying out her duties, but insisted that the company’s management should account for its public claims and the unresolved complaint.

“My last words to her were: tell your people not to bother sending you again. Bring the explanation and the results of your so-called investigation to court. We meet MTN and the other telcos at the Federal High Court, Abuja, on the 18th of this month,” he said.

As of the time of filing this report, Mr Amobi has not responded to PREMIUM TIMES with the details of the legal steps he plans to take or other circumstances surrounding his experience with the mobile network operator. MTN is also yet to respond to this newspaper’s request for comment.

Similar encounters

Mr Amobi’s post triggered similar reactions from other social media users with similar past experiences with Nigerian telecommunicationsservice providers.

Akinrinlola Olamide, a software engineer, said she has had comparable incidents repeatedly, alleging that MTN’s data usage meter is no longer functioning on the telco’s app.

“This is ridiculous; it has been happening to mine too, and they keep doing it because I’m not talking; their data usage meter is no longer working on their app,” Mr Olamide said.

Also sharing his experience, an X user, Big Sam @_samueld_, expressed his displeasure with the disappearance of his 1.28 terabyte data subscriptions, adding that he reached out to the telco for a remedy to the situation but got no response.

“I wish I could go to court too. My 1.28TB data disappeared overnight! I have sent a detailed email to MTN and tagged necessary regulatory bodies; nothing has been done. More than a month has passed,” he said.
The complaints persist despite regulatory measures introduced by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to shield telecommunications subscribers from unexplained data depletion, billing errors, and poor network services.

In January 2021, the NCC announced that it had instituted a forensic audit to investigate complaints of unexplained data depletion and wrongful deductions from subscribers’ accounts, with the possibility of compensating affected consumers.

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However, complaints persisted, prompting the regulator in May 2024 to direct mobile network operators to audit their billing systems, following renewed reports of unexplained data depletion.

In July 2024, the commission also introduced the Nigerian Communications (Quality of Service) Regulations, which established minimum service-quality standards for telecommunications operators. It provided for the measurement, reporting and monitoring of network performance.

When complaints about rapid data depletion and inaccurate billing persisted, the NCC, in August 2025, directed telecommunications operators to engage independent audit firms to scrutinise their billing systems.

The regulator has also introduced additional consumer-protection measures, including a refund framework for failed airtime and data transactions in January 2026 and a compensation framework for subscribers affected by poor network services in March 2026.

That notwithstanding, complaints of unexplained data depletion remain commonplace, raising questions about the efficacy of existing regulatory measures and the transparency of operators’ billing systems.
The extent to which subscribers can accurately verify their data consumption also remains uncertain.