Wednesday, December 15, 2010

MOBILE PHONE COMPANIES OBLIGED TO SHARE MASTS

The Mozambican Council of Ministers (Cabinet) approved on Tuesday in Maputo a new regulation requiring Mozambique mobile phone operators to share their masts and other facilities.Speaking to the media after Cabinet meeting, the Government spokesman, Deputy Justice Minister Alberto Nkutumula, said the measure aims to rationalize the resources of the operators through sharing facilities, especially mobile phone masts.Mozambique currently has two mobile phone operators. These are the publicly owned Mcel and the South African company, Vodacom. The number of customers of the two operators taken together is estimated at about six million. Next year the third mobile phone operator, Movitel, in which the main shareholder is the Vietnamese state company Vietel, should start operating.“The goal is the rationalization of telecommunications”, said Nkutumula. “For example, if you go to a district such as Sanga, (in the northern province of Niassa), where there is only one Vodacom mobile phone mast, based on this decree if Mcel and Movitel set up in Sanga, that same Vodacom mast will be used by all three operators”.The expansion of mobile phone network coverage in the country and the rationalization of resources in the maintenance of infrastructure are other objectives of this Regulation, he added. Thus if there is a breakdown in a shared mast, the cost of the repairs will be shared by the companies using the mast.

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