Etisalat International on Monday said it had terminated a management agreement with its Nigerian unit, saying that it had given the business about three weeks to phase out the Etisalat brand in the country.

The Chief Executive Officer, Etisalat International, Hatem Dowidar, told Reuters that the exit process became necessary given that the firm had been unsuccessful at converting some of its dollar debts to naira.

The Nigerian Communications Commission and the Central Bank of Nigeria had recently intervened to save Etisalat Nigeria from collapse after it failed to pay the remaining $589m from a $1.2bn loan it took from a consortium of 13 banks.

Before then, all the United Arab Emirates shareholders of Etisalat Nigeria, including state-owned investment fund, Mubadala, had exited the company and left the board and management.