S.Africa telecom firms working to cut tariffs - govt (Reuters)

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African telecom companies have agreed to work with the government to cut the cost of phone calls and Internet access in Africa's biggest economy, the government said on Tuesday.

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Consumer groups had hoped the government would make concrete proposals -- such as forcing Telkom to unbundle the local loop -- following several recent meetings with industry players that had been slated to bring action.

But the government statement gave no details of plans for tackling high costs -- which Mbeki has cited as a drag on growth -- other than saying industry players and the government would work on a "policy review".

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Right so Government says telecoms costs are to high and all the players agree and nothing happens.
More hot air and sweet buggerall action from the government. All the talk shops rendered was free lunch,,,, again.
Business as usual, yawn.
http://za.today.reuters.com/news/Ne...RTRIDST_0_OZABS-TELECOMS-SAFRICA-20051101.XML

Speaking of which i see the convergence bill has been passed and waiting to be signed into law.. now anyone know if unbundling etc is in there or is that up to someone else ?

I have downloaded a version of the bill, but I don't know if its the correct one. Will check.

No, none of the "platform levelling" stuff is in there, like LLU or opening of the landing point.

Only thing we can hope for would be decent interconnect rates.

Was Telkom involved in this conference? Their actions Nov.1 proclaim that they speak with forked tongue.

Hang Telkom high!

What a joke ... if companies like Telkom want to 'cut tariffs', they don't need to 'work with government' to do it ... they just need to, well, do it. I mean they set the frickin' prices. This is just another delaying and PR tactic. "Create a policy review" is doublespeak for "spend another year generating useless unnecessary paperwork in order to create the pretense of working towards lower prices", which simultaneously also distracts government from working on actual solutions. And press releases like this placate the public. These companies appear to be tricking the government, which seemingly is either very naive and trusting and keeps falling for it, or there are many vested interests (publicly known and 'under the table'), or - I suspect - both.