Nepad,SA in cable talks
Discussions are under way to combine the SA government initiative to develop a submarine cable along the West Coast of Africa with a continental project of the New Partnership for African Development (Nepad) to prevent duplication.
The Presidency was driving the talks between the communication and public enterprises departments for a combined initiative between newly launched state-owned broadband infrastructure company Infraco and UHURUnet, a special purpose vehicle of Nepad, Keith Shongwe, communications department deputy director-general for ICT international affairs and trade told Parliament’s communications committee yesterday.
UHURUnet is planning to install a cable around the entire African continent which it expects will become operational by the first quarter of 2010.
The Nepad special purpose vehicle will be ultimately owned by more than 120 African telecommunications and other companies and will have a stake of about 30% in Baharicom, the owner and operator of the cable.
African telecommunication companies and investors, including SA, will have a 45% stake and international investors 25%, Shongwe said.
On the East Coast, cables are being laid by the Seacom consortium and by Eassy, a consortium of South African and other African operators which Shongwe said were due to become operational by the fourth quarter of next year .
The committee was also briefed on the plans for digital migration.
Committee chairman Ismail Vadi again expressed grave concerns about the tight time frames laid down by government. The full conversion from analogue to digital broadcasting is scheduled for November 2011.
“I really don’t get a sense of urgency anywhere, neither in the ministry nor the department. I can’t see us doing this thing. This is one of the biggest projects in the country,” Vadi said.
Lara Kantor, the chairperson of Digital Dzonga which was created to drive the migration, told the committee that she believed the switch off date might have to be changed as the project was “an enormous and complex” one.
Fostering consumer awareness of what the migration entailed would be critical to ensuring its success.
Kantor also emphasised that if set-top boxes were to be available by the November switch-on date, then the manufacturers would have to have the specifications from the department by the end of next month .
She said the boxes, which will convert digital signals for analogue television sets, would have to be affordable. To assist with this, government subsidies were planned. Kantor noted that the price of boxes was expected to fall by about 15% a year .
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