Bringing down communications costs is a national imperative, says Jane Duncan, the professor who sits in the Highway Africa chair for media and the information society at Rhodes University.
Presenting before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications, late on Tuesday, Duncan delivered a number of recommendations that a survey of a poor community in the Eastern Cape city of eRhini (Grahamstown) had made.
Among these recommendations are that airtime be regulated to make it affordable for prepaid users, that “spaza” (small community) shop owners have their mark-up limited to between 50c and R1, that there should be more off-peak hours, and that the retail prices of telecommunications be reduced by between 40% and 50%. Furthermore, it was recommended that airtime price-fixing be investigated and that the weekend discount window be increased.
Findings of the survey showed communications usage trends, which include landlines, are virtually non-existent as telecoms is too expensive; that cellphones are mainly used as receiving devices for calls or to send “please call me” messages and not used to converse; and that women are the most heavily affected.
emergencies. Meanwhile, the elderly are left stranded, learners can not communicate about their studies, and the unemployed are missing job opportunities.
She quoted a member of the Unemployed People's Movement saying the inability to communicate is “like a disease that will disable you to reach a certain point in life, because once you missed some opportunities in life, they will never come back - at least for as long as you live”.
The Highway Africa survey found people living in eRhini spend almost 26% of their gross income on the cost to communicate.
On Wednesday, when closing the two-day session, communications committee chairperson Ismail Vadi said: “I wish all those big companies had stayed for that [Highway Africa] presentation and what the Unemployed People's Movement had to say. That reminds us why we are conducting this hearing.”
Share
