The Sunday Mail
Senior Reporter
Telecommunications companies that refuse to share infrastructure with competitors will face heavy fines in line with new regulations gazetted last week.In terms of the Statutory Instrument 137 of 2016 gazetted last Friday, all licensed telecoms operators are now compelled by law to share infrastructure wherever it is technically and economically possible.
The Posts and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe will supervise applications for sharing, approve sharing agreements, and audit and identify sharable infrastructure. The regulations are envisaged to eliminate duplication of telecommunications infrastructure while also maximising use of existing and future telecommunications infrastructure.
This is in line with the new National ICT Policy recently approved by Government. ICT, Postal and Courier Services Minister Supa Mandiwanzira has argued that duplication of infrastructure is a burden on subscribers and Treasury through depletion of nostro accounts as most equipment was imported.
He said duplication — and sometimes triplication — of telecommunications infrastructure, especially base station towers, was equivalent to building three highways from Harare to Bulawayo parallel to each other. He said: “The regulations are an important step forward for the industry in terms of reducing the cost of service to subscribers and making companies more efficient and profitable.
“It is my contention that telecoms companies should not and must not be allowed to compete on the number of buildings, towers, or optic fibre cable they have but they should compete on service. “Whoever has built more infrastructure than the other should share it within a framework that makes it commercially viable for the operator.”
Potraz can now compel operators to share infrastructure in the national interest. Operators can share space, towers, power, shelters, security, optic fibre cables, copper cables, trenches, manholes, ducts and poles among others. In terms of the regulations an “infrastructure seeker” should make a request in writing to the “infrastructure provider” stating the type of infrastructure required for sharing as well as the technical and physical requirements.
The seeker will be responsible for the cost of processing the request, which should be responded to within 14 working days. The SI reads in part: “No infrastructure provider shall decline a request to share unless he or she satisfies the authority that such sharing “(i) is not feasible; and (ii) would cause damage to the nature and function of such infrastructure; and (ii) is not economically feasible; and
“(ii) would prevent the infrastructure provider from fulfilling his or her own reasonably anticipated requirements in terms of the licence conditions.”
Also, infrastructure providers can advertise in newspapers with national circulation expressing interest in sharing infrastructure. Portraz will determine costs of sharing, and the charge to the infrastructure seeker shall not be more than the cost of owning and operating similar infrastructure.
On infrastructure sharing negotiations and agreements no licence holder shall: “9(1)(a) obstruct or delay negotiations; or (b) refuse to designate proper representative to take part in negotiations; or (c) refuse to provide relevant information; or (d) misrepresent facts.”
Negotiations should be completed within three months from the day the initial request is made after which the final agreement is submitted to Portraz for approval within 15 days. At any stage of negotiation, any aggrieved party may refer the matter to Potraz for resolution. The country’s largest mobile telecoms network, Econet Wireless, has previously said it will resist sharing its infrastructure with competitors until it generates a significant return on investments made over the last two decades.
The telecoms giant, however, seems to have relented, having recently agreed to share infrastructure with State-owned TelOne.
