Director General of the Dept of Comm on LLU

[ebis]

Hi all,

I put this thread in the "News Discussion" because I got the info from a credible source, namely: an interview between the Director General herself and Morning Live this morning.

I'm a Morning Live fan (the SABC2 news show between 6-8am each weekday) and luckily, I managed to catch one of the presenters (Vuyo) interviewing the Director General of the Dept of Communications (Ms Lyndall Shope-Mafole) this morning.

The topic was on the conference that will soon be held by the President's International Advisory Council on Information Society and Development. I'm sure most of you guys know what this council is all about, so I'm not gonna bore you on the details. Anyway, Vuyo asked the Mafole several questions and I was intrigued by some of the answers she gave.

First of all, Vuyo asked if the DoC has achieved much in ensuring that Telephony and broadband prices in SA are becoming affordable. This was one of the key suggestions that the Advisory Council gave to Pres Mbeki last year. I was impressed by Mafole's answer, only because she was at least being honest. She bluntly put it across that the DoC hasn't really done much in this arena and that this remains a key issue that needs to be addressed. I was just glad that the DoC didn't lie by saying that telephony and broadband prices are becoming affordable. Cause, as we all know, they're not.

The second (and more interesting) question asked was what the DoC will be doing to meet the above-mentioned suggestion put across by the Advisory Council last year. Mafole stated that one of the areas that the DoC was really looking into was Local Loop Unbundling (LLU). She then stated that the minister will soon be announcing "policy directives" on LLU. This would probably be done in the next colloquium to be hosted by the DoC.

I'm going to be optimistic and hope that the "policy directives" will mean that the local loop will be unbundled. I'm not sure whether this local loop would be opened up to all VANS operators or just SNO, but the thought of it NOT being solely owned by Telkom is a good one.

What do you guys think??? Any hope in hell that Poison Ivy will actually allow this to happen???

 

[munwaal]

Personally, I know better than to get optimistic. That being said, the first step in resolving a problem is always to acknowlege that there IS, in fact, a problem. As you said, at least she didn't say that services were becoming more affordable.

Personally, I don't see LLU becoming a reality for VANS for a very long time. It does make sense for the SNO, though.

 

[rsd]

Oooooh thanks for the news update!

That sounds pretty awesome. With any luck they won't wake Ivy up - Pete the plank can just sign any relevant documentation on her behalf

Chances are Pete has a better grasp of the ICT sector anyway.

I think LLU could very well happen. That coupled with declaring sat-3/safe an essential service would make the SA telecoms environment veeeery interesting.

 

[mccrack]

My bet it's to cater solely for the SNO.

Unbundling it completely would mean the SNO would have to compete with other VANS from inception.

 

[stoke]

Interesting - wonder why she chose that forum to make it public ? Wierd.
But - yup - it will happen - promises were made, the SNO has to work, this is a necessary step for the SNO to work, and definately, only for the SNO's use, otherwise, no third network operator will be drawn in.

 

[lewstherin]

As always - especially when discussing comments made by government officials:

IBIWISI

 

[Sneeky]

IBIWISI

Help a white brutha out here, Ibiwisi?

 

[stoke]

*sigh* I believe it when i see it.

 

[mccrack]

Very similiar then to WYSIWUG.

What you see is what you get

Too many acronyms in the world .... they are called acronyms right ?

 

[Sneeky]

Blonde moment, my bad

 

[ebis]

It's a wait-and-see game, there's pretty much nothing else we can do.

With Poison Ivy at the helm, one can only be sure of one result: UNCERTAINTY.

 

[mbs]

... corridor-speak confirms it'll happen, though details remain locked up tighter than access to Telkrap's contention ratios...

 

[mccrack]

ssssh ..... you cannot say 'contention ratio' , that's telkom's intellectual property

 

[rsd]

Ta mbs

 

[MrSmith]

BTW Morning Live will apparently be broadcasting live from the conference on the President's International Advisory Council on Information Society and Development tomorrow morning for those that are interested.

 

[mbs]

Can't be, surely? Methinx that show's only on weekdays...

 

[cobuss]

With reference to the original post. I'm cautiously optimistic .

 

[Moederloos]

Too many acronyms in the world .... they are called acronyms right ?

Actually they are called TLA's or MLA's *



* (Three letter acronyms and multi-letter acronyms)

 

[LooneyBandit]

I think Telkom's scared thet someone really sees how much markup they are putting on the broadband and therefore do not want to release contention ratios etc. I agree that the first step to solving this and any problems is first and foremost owning up to the fact that there IS a problem