MTN has made a commitment to link arms with entities fighting for cheaper telecommunications in SA, one of the most expensive countries in the world when it comes to mobile tariffs.
This comes about a week after the Independent Communciations Authority of SA (ICASA) launched its Cost to Communicate programme - which will probe and adjust the country's telecoms pricing regime - and days after the Right2Know organisation held a mass protest for provisional free airtime and data allotments from SA's two main operators, Vodacom and MTN.
SA is ranked 117th most expensive in terms of mobile rates - out of 140 countries globally.
MTN said this week that it had extended an invitation to the Right2Know campaign "to engage in constructive dialogue" regarding the demands the campaign raised in a letter sent to both MTN and Vodacom last month.
Among other demands, the Right2Know campaign called for SMS to become free of charge. Robert Madzonga, MTN's chief corporate services officer, says the implementation of a zero rate on any product or service that costs money to produce may be seen as expropriation and "potentially tantamount to an offence as defined under the Competition Act".
Madzonga says the operator has introduced products that "further reduce the cost of communication". He cites products such as MTN Zone and Mahala Thursdays, both of which he says have seen significant uptake.
The Sunday papers this week feature MTN's new promotion - available until the end of August - that offers prepaid and TopUp customers "50% Mahala Airtime". The operator says the promotion "supports cheaper calls, SMSes and Internet access".
Network investment
In response to the Right2Know campaign's demands that MTN (and Vodacom) invest in network maintenance and development, MTN says it is already investing in its network - on a day to day basis.
"A very cursory view of our annual financial reports would make it clear that MTN invests more than R4 billion to R6 billion rand annually on network expansion and modernisation, with the goal of universal access across SA.
"Over the last four years our capital expenditure on the network and billing systems were in the region of R20.4 billion. The company offers 99% population coverage, including rural and peri-urban areas throughout South Africa, a country of over 1.2 million km^2."
ICASA enquiries
With regard transparency and the provision of pertinent information, MTN says it has complied with legitimate information requests from ICASA and the Department of Communications. "This information is submitted on a confidential basis as circumstances require."
Madzonga notes, however, that the company "also has the fiduciary responsibility to protect information that is confidential and key to its competitiveness".
ICASA's Cost to Communicate programme aims to stimulate public debate around the cost to communicate in SA. The programme includes a regulatory broadband value chain study, the creation and collection of ICT indicators for an ICASA database, local loop unbundling regulations, a review of wholesale services and a review of the existing call termination regulations.
MTN says it welcomes and supports the ICASA regulatory programme, and promises to "fully participate". The company says it lauds ICASA for taking an approach that will be evidence-based - as opposed to one based on opinion.
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