Icasa interconnect decision welcomed
“Icasa has a constitutional mandate to ensure that this naturally monopolistic function, which connects users between fixed and mobile phone networks, is effectively regulated,” Lindiwe Mazibuko, the Democratic Alliance’s spokeswoman said in a statement.
This followed an earlier announcement by Icasa that it had proposed cuts in the mobile interconnect (termination) rate.
“The DA noted that Icasa — following its completion of a statutory market review process — planned to gazette draft regulations on wholesale call termination tomorrow [Friday], with a view to commencing the written submissions and public hearings processes in June 2010.”
The party added that the proposed tariffs were significantly lower than those initially proposed and later implemented by the major mobile network operators, and demonstrated the extent of the market failure which needed to be addressed by Icasa in this regard.
Icasa proposed an initial reduction from the current 89c per minute, to 65c in July 2010, 50c in July 2011, and 40c in July 2012 for mobile interconnection.
It also proposed an initial reduction to 15c per minute in July 2010, 12c in July 2011, and 10c in July 2012 for fixed-line interconnection.
The DA said it welcomed Icasa’s decision to finally act.
“Today’s [Thursday] announcement is good news not only for South African consumers — who have too long been left at the mercy of prohibitively high telephony costs — but also represents an important step in the crucial process of liberalising South Africa’s telecoms sector in order to enable new entrants to offer cheaper, more efficient services to the consumer and stimulate competition in the sector.”
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