Created in Bamako on October 28, 2003, FRATEL’s main mission is to establish and strengthen collaboration and exchanges between its members. The Moroccan Az-El-Arabe Hassibi led the organization for the year 2023. Louis-Marc Sakala, the director general of the Postal and Electronic Communications Regulatory Agency of Congo (ARPCE), is the new president of the French-speaking Telecommunications...
Huawei has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Communications Regulators’ Association of Southern Africa (CRASA) to drive Africa’s digital transformation. CRASA is a Southern Africa consultative technical body with 13 Countries as members (Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe) focusing among several...
The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) Competition Commission (CCC) has fined Malawi Telecom Towers, Helios Towers Limited and Madagascar Towers SA a combined total of 0.05% of their turnover in the Common Market in the financial year of 2020 for failure to notify the organisation of their proposed acquisition on time. The...
The Botswana Communication Regulatory Authority (BOCRA) has issued type approval verification guidelines for SIM-enabled devices to regulate access to the country’s telecommunications system network. BOCRA spokesperson Aaron Nyelesi said the guidelines are meant to protect the ICT networks and the consumers against adverse effects of widespread “non-type approved counterfeit and substandard devices.” The intention is...
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has published its ‘Guidelines on National Roaming’, which prescribe a regulatory framework for the implementation of national roaming services in Nigeria. According to the guidelines, licensed service providers shall request and negotiate national roaming agreements with each other on bilateral and non-discriminatory terms, while multiple agreements can be signed with...
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has announced plans to restructure the country’s current licensing structure to bring it in line with global standards in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) ecosystem. The current structure has served the industry for 18 years since its publication, and as NCC CEO, Umar Danbatta, says, it is due for...
An extension to the deadline for comments on proposed revisions to Zambia’s licensing guidelines has been announced by the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA). Last month the regulator published a ‘Licensing Guidelines Consultation Paper’, in which it sought to outline the challenges identified in the current licensing framework – which was implemented back...
Ericsson and the African Telecommunications Union (ATU) have committed to a MoU governing the rollout of spectrum recommendations to transform Africa into a knowledge economy. The recommendations are designed to help fast-track the development and application of technologies that boost connectivity and innovation. According to the company and organisation, in Africa, a limited amount of spectrum is...
Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTC) has started with the process of registering subscriber identification module (SIM) cards in Namibia. However, the going is tough as MTC finds it difficult to finalise the process, as no legislative mandate yet exists to empower them to smoothly deal with the process. MTC MD Licky Erastus shared this information during...
Cameroonian authorities, which are facing several security challenges, must be able to identify the chips used by terrorists. But some telephone operators remain lax as to the rules for identifying their subscribers. The operations to identify telephone subscribers in Cameroon do not seem to be taking place within the standards. This is suggested by a letter that...
