ACT goes quiet on Fair Share in South Africa

[Jan]

Vodacom and MTN want Netflix and WhatsApp to pay up in South Africa

The Association of Communications and Technology (ACT) has been quiet on its calls for over-the-top services such as Netflix, WhatsApp, and YouTube to pay for network infrastructure costs in South Africa.

The industry body comprises prominent South African telecoms players like Vodacom, MTN, Cell C, Liquid, Rain, and Telkom.

 

[Scooby_Doo]

ACT - what a waste of oxygen.

 

[oros]

This again, very laughably the most idiotic idea the networks or this association had.....

 

[ThinkCentre]

In the end it is the end-user that pays for everything and they do pay Vodacom and MTN for their services.

 

[chrisc]

The same argument might be applied to road users. The infrastructure has to be made available to everybody, or we would not progress

 

[kazeus]

The same argument might be applied to road users. The infrastructure has to be made available to everybody, or we would not progress

I agree. So MTN and Vodacom should effectively start subsidise all roadworks and fixtures as phonecalls and text messages results in people making plans to meet up both for work and for personal reasons, which causes increased usage of the road network, thus increasing potholes and contributing to the deterioration of our roads

 

[Rickster]

Am I missing something?

Data isn't free, a potion of that money we pay for data goes to their infrastructure.

 

[system32]

Double Dipping.

The end user is already paying huge for data - see how much profit MTN and Vodacom are making from data charges:

MTN Group Data Revenue: Surged by 37.7% to reach R101.5 billion on a reported basis. This milestone marks the first time MTN's data business has crossed the R100 billion mark, contributing over 46% of total group service revenue.

MTN Financial Results2025
see https://mtn-investor.com/reporting/annuals-2025/index.php

Vodacom data traffic (and revenue) grew 32% in South Africa in 2026
see https://mybroadband.co.za/news/busi...com-data-traffic-grew-32-in-south-africa.html

This whole OTT is a scam - without WhatsApp, Youtube, Netflix, TikToc, FB, etc, no one would bother buying data.
These services drive MTN & Voda profits.

 

[oros]

This again, very laughably the most idiotic idea the networks or this association had.....

And obviously as we all know, consumers will pay more or foot the bill like they say..... Their clearly either don't care for the consumers or they must start smoking something else.....

 

[konfab]

In May 2025, Batyi said OTT players such as Netflix and YouTube consumed significant amounts of bandwidth without contributing to their upkeep.

“It is time to get tough, especially to those over-the-top players who use a lot of bandwidth, especially in the form of video. They generate a lot of traffic,” she said.

So why don't they help with the regulatory model and get Starlink here. Then Starlink can handle all the high bandwidth traffic.

 

[HumanShield]

https://actforsa.co.za/our-team/

So just vested interests here. Make it sound independent but it's not