R5bn for West Coast sub cable

[quovadis]

I realise that this is in regards to the same cable mentioned in an earlier news article on myadsl done by business report but came across this on ITWeb... it has ALOT of additional information:

http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/telecoms/2007/0708011200.asp?A=INT&S=Internet&O=FPLEAD

Government will spend about R5 billion over the next two years to lay a new 6Tb submarine cable.

The cable will be placed between Mtunzini, on the KwaZulu-Natal coast, and Cape Town, where the cable will split with a 3Tb line running to London, in the UK, and another to Fortaleza, in Brazil.

Public enterprises director-general Portia Molefe says at least one leg of the cable must be in place by June 2009, when SA will host the FIFA Confederations Cup as a prelude to the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup. Molefe expects the Brazilian leg will be in place first.

They've got less than 2 years to lay this cable All I can say is GOOD LUCK ! If they pull it off I'll take my hat off to government.

Then one interesting bit ... quote from Public Enterprises Deputy General (seems to know more than Ivy) and may I suggest a portfolio change - he's in the wrong department!

RPM... perhaps an interview???

Mcwabeni quoted 2004 International Telecommunications Union figures that showed SA's US dollar cost of 100Kbps as $21.93, versus Japan, Sweden and Korea, where it was a fraction of a dollar.

“The average price is $2 and best practice is 18 US cents,” he says, respectively 10 times and 125 times cheaper than in SA. “Our position has not improved since. “If we want to play in the global economy, we have to make access more available.”

 

[Alchemist]

Thanks quovadis.

He does definitely seem to know a lot more than what we currently have sitting at the DoC gathering cobwebs.

 

[capetownguy]

mm..i thought fortaleza is in argentina

 

[Inertia]

Molefe says the cable's funding is also still under consideration. “We are still investigating what we think will be an innovative model,” she says, adding this will include state, as well as Nepad (New Partnership for Africa's Development) funding. “Telkom wants to buy a large slice of that capacity and we are happy with that.”

That part scares me.