MPs Condemns ICASA For Reluctance To Granting License To Infraco

The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) has come under pressure from Members of Paliament (MPs) for its reluctance to grant Broadband Infraco with both service and network licenses. "If the committee wants we can do it tomorrow, but the process will be held up in court for the next five years, there is no shortcut to regulation.” Icasa Councillor Fungai Sibanda told Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Public Enterprise.

He said he believed a decision on a network license would be made by the end of the month, but warned that if any operator believed the process to be flawed, they would not hesitate to take ICASA's decision on review.

The company was established in 2007 by the Department of Enterprise to lay a digital backbone across South Africa as a contribution to enhanced access to information for poor and rural areas and lower broadband costs for everyone else.

Fungai Sibanda has the support from Communication’s Minister Siphiwe Nyanda, who said Infraco had applied for a dual license, one to allow it to offer retail services and the other to authorize it to offer wholesale network service.  He reiterated  it had never been the company’s mandate to compete with commercial operators. Cabinet took a decision in January 2007 to approve Broadband Infraco as an Information Technology (IT) backbone to reduce the cost to consumers by providing infrastructure to others at a wholesale rate.

Chairperson of the committee, Vytjie Mentor, said granting the license was "critical for Infraco to provide the service it is meant to", while committee members suggested ICASA was bowing to pressure from big communications companies that feared competition from Infraco.

ICASA, Infraco and the government have asked for legal opinion to try to overcome differing interpretations of the Electronic Communications Amendment Act, under which the licenses are being sought.

Reagan Malumo
Programme Officer: Media Freedom Monitoring and Research
Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Regional Secretariat
21 Johann Albrecht St
Private Bag 13386
Windhoek
Namibia
Phone: +264 61 232 975
Fax: +264 61 248 016
Mobile: +264 81 311 2626
E mail: reagan@misa.org

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