Miscommunication is a factor of a time of uncertainty. During such periods, people are inclined to hear what they want to hear, rather than what is actually being said and filtering out the truth is no little thing.
Friday last week, ITWeb published as its lead story comments reportedly made by a member of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications, Kgotso Khumalo, that government would license a third fixed-line and a fourth cellular operator - market-moving news even in the most ordinary of times.
However, our times are far from being ordinary. Telecommunications is on the cusp of the biggest changes ever being made to the sector, as the regulator, the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA), is about to finalise the regulations on who can or cannot get electronic communications network service (ECNS) licences.
Holders of such licences will have the power to build and deploy their own networks, irrespective of the technology used. Once promulgated, there will no longer be any fixed-line or mobile operators in the strict sense of the terms. Such operators will be able to use whatever technology they need to build a network in a certain area, subject only to their actual licence conditions and available spectrum.
Technology neutrality is the cornerstone of the Electronic Communications Act (ECA). Parliament recognised that pinning company licences down to a specific method of offering their services was no longer valid. Now that one can receive broadcast signals over a cellular phone, does it make it a TV or a telephone? That question was answered in that law.
The next objective of the Act was to reduce the cost of telecommunications. In order to do this, competition must be introduced at all market levels, namely the retail side, the content offerings and finally on the infrastructure side.
Answering the riddle
So when an MP such as Kgotso Khumalo is reported to have made comments about new fixed and mobile operator licences (and he was a key member in drafting the ECA), and when his comments are reported by a reputable journalist and then backed up by people who are industry veterans attending the same event; one has to ask how can this happen?
The two-step dance - one foot forward and two back - has been a recurring theme for the past eight years as far as telecommunications policy is concerned
Paul Vecchiatto, Cape Town correspondent, ITWeb
The answer to the riddle is that the Department of Communications has never published a document that articulates the so-called policy of "managed liberalisation". Like many other policy failures this government has delivered (including that on immigration), we have no idea of what their intention is and what they see as being the final outcome.
The two-step dance - one foot forward and two back - has been a recurring theme for the past eight years as far as telecommunications policy is concerned. The "Ministerial Determinations" of September 2004, where the market was "liberalised" in terms of the old Telecommunications Act, were a sham. Schools are still not getting their 50% e-rate discount, because no-one knows what it actually is, and value added networks were at first given and then had their right to self-provide taken away.
It is no wonder then the DOC, ICASA and communications minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri are facing High Court actions from Altron and the Wireless Applications Providers Association. Such action was anticipated two years ago when the ECA was drafted and now the chickens are coming home to roost.
The worst part of all of this is that companies are now beginning to take legal action against each other and so the cost of business will rise, and when this happens it is the consumer who pays the price.
What is needed is clear policy direction. Unfortunately, with the minister's budget vote speech due on 3 June, I don't think we will get it.
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