Delegates to the Southern African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference (Satnac) event at a resort in the Drakensberg this week voiced great ambitions to take broadband access to SA`s rural masses.
It has to be said: this may be aiming a little high in a country where entire villages have been known to share a single phone.
Many areas have virtually no telecoms infrastructure, and service providers never miss an opportunity to tell us how expensive it is to roll-out such infrastructure.
There is no denying that universal access to telephony is a necessity, but broadband access as a necessity seems over-ambitious.
Damaria Senne, senior journalist, ITWeb
Where infrastructure has been rolled out in rural areas, it is sadly but generally stolen. Batteries are routinely stolen from wireless towers. Cables disappear overnight. So how on earth can we expect to simply roll-out broadband to the underserviced masses?
"Universal broadband access is a necessity," Dr Mark Kimpe said during a Satnac panel discussion on the connectivity lifeline in a broadband environment.
Thami Msimango also argued passionately in favour of universal broadband access. We can`t leave the poor behind, he said, adding that as a country we have to find a way to get broadband to them.
However, having worked in the non-profit sector with many poor communities where access to basic telephony remains a big challenge, I couldn`t help being sceptical.
There is no denying that universal access to telephony is a necessity, but broadband access as a necessity seems over-ambitious.
Why are we aiming so high so soon, when we might do better by focusing on providing basic telephony services to members of SA`s second world economy and allow for the natural progression of telecoms services?
Let`s try crawling before we can walk.
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