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WEEKLY PUBLICATION DEADLINE: 12 pm GMT Sunday. ISSUE NO 372 West African licence tendering processes – a case to answerA recent gaggle of licensing decisions in West Africa demonstrate that all is not well with tendering processes in the sub-region. They have left the idea of supposedly independent regulatory decision on the sidelines and have been as transparent as mud. Russell Southwood lays out what went wrong and asks why these processes cannot be more open and fair. First, let’s look at the evidence of recent licensing decisions that have been made in the sub-region: Benin: In mid-August 2007, the Benin Government announced that Nigerian SNO Globacom had won a mobile licence for which it would pay FCFA33 billion. The Beninois Government has made much in its disputes with the telecoms sector of how decisions taken by the previous Government were taken incorrectly and improperly. Therefore it was somewhat strange that there was no public tender for this new licence and major international companies do not seem to have been approached about it. Instead, the tendering list consisted of two companies: a well-known and well-funded Nigerian operator and almost unknown Libyan company without operating experience. Faced with such a limited choice, there was really only one logical option. The bidding process was launched on 3 August and concluded at a Council of Ministers on 10 August, allowing under seven days for any company to prepare a major bid and submit it. Gambia: At the end of August 2007, Gambia’s Department of State for Communications and Information Technology announced that an almost unheard of Lebanese company Spectrum was buying a majority shareholding in the country’s incumbent Gamtel (and its mobile subsidiary Gamcel). The investor will not be directly managing the company but has appointed contract managers Detecon to carry out this task on its behalf. There was no open tendering process and the regulator PURA was informed of the decision after it had been taken. Although the Government said it had “been reviewing various proposals for strategic partnership”, both the manner of its choosing and the final choice seem rather odd. The Government’s excuse was that the company was near bankruptcy and heavily indebted. However, since heavily indebted telco incumbents have been known to stagger forward for an almost unseemly number of years (witness Gabon Telecom or Telkom Kenya) this reason cannot surely be the whole story. Senegal: After taking three years to reach the tendering stage, the Senegalese regulator ARPT announced the tendering process on 17 August and the deadline for receiving bids as 31 August, a mere 12 days later. There was no formal international tendering process and the bids were not opened publicly in front of the bidders. Although the regulator is responsible for managing the process of the bid and its announcement, the decision is actually taken directly by the Government. The Government’s ICT Adviser was closely involved in the process of formulating the letting of the new licence. He also sits on the Board of the new entrant’s major competitor Sonatel (now trading as Orange), a circumstance that would be regarded as a conflict of interest in many other countries. At least the field was a bit wider than in Benin. The winner Sudatel paid US$200 million and it bid against against 11 other competitors, including Kuwaiti-owned Celtel and Bintel of Saudia Arabia. Ghana: The licensing process for a new mobile operator has not yet started but it is clear that the Government has all but promised Globacom that it will get its licence, provided it goes through due process. These assurances must in some part account for the confident pronouncements made by some of its local managers about obtaining the licence. We await with keen interest to see both how the process will be carried out and the name of the eventual winner. Perhaps there will be a surprise upset decision but we’re not putting money on it. The cynics will say: why does this all matter? That’s how business is done in Africa. There are perhaps two good reasons for disagreeing with these siren voices. Firstly, the quality of bidders is important. A little known company with not much operating experience may not invest as much as an organisation with wider experience of running operations across the continent. The under-funded licence operator may treat the licence simply as a cash cow and seek to strip the assets and cream off short-term profits. This is not to say that there are not major operators at whom the same accusations might be levelled but the major operators all have accountancy disclosure processes that make this kind of behaviour more transparent. The second reason for caring is amply illustrated by the case of Benin. If the decisions are badly taken, then it only takes a successor Government to re-open those decisions for everything to begin to unravel. This is a political risk for companies and undermines the credibility of any Government seeking further foreign investment. Strangely for a country so associated in the public mind with corruption, Nigeria set the benchmark for how things should be done with its first public auction of mobile licences and its regulator has gone on to tender for major licences in a largely open and transparent way. It can be done and there are good commercial and political reasons why it should be done. CORRECTION: Contrary to reports in the Kenyan press that we picked up in last week's issue, Seacom has not pulled out of its east coast fibre project.
Mbeki Brokers $60m Benin Deal for MTNMTN has agreed to pay a licence fee of $60m to have its network reconnected in Benin in a settlement brokered by President Thabo Mbeki and Benin's President Thomas Boni Yayi. MTN's network was silenced when the telecoms regulator tried to force all four cellular networks to pay $52m in backdated fees after it retrospectively raised the price of a licence 500%. MTN refused initially, and its network in the West African country was turned on July 12. At the weekend, the regulator's vice-president, Victor Tokpanou, announced on national television that MTN could resume its service. "The MTN group has accepted the conditions laid out in the new fees structure," Tokpanou said. MTN had agreed to pay the new fee for its 10-year licence. MTN CEO Phuthuma Nhleko previously criticised the authorities for acting "completely outside the licence conditions" and crossing the boundaries of both local and international laws. "We really don't believe that what they are asking for is appropriate," he said last month. The network in Benin is trading as Spacetel, and was inherited by MTN through its $5.5bn takeover of Investcom. MTN said yesterday negotiations had been going on with Benin's government since the network was shut down 10 weeks ago. The agreement will see MTN accept a new licensing framework and pay $60m for a new, extended licence. Of that, $30m is payable within 30 days of signing the agreement, with the rest payable in annual instalments of $4.2m over seven years. In return, the government pledged to issue a new licence to MTN for 10 more years, grant it a three-year tax holiday, exempt it from customs duties for five years and reduce various annual licence fees from 6% to 3%. The government will extend MTN's licence for a further five years if it meets developmental targets still to be agreed. In a further concession, the government promised to try to facilitate an extension of the tax holiday for a period of more than three years. "MTN cannot comment further on the agreement," the company said yesterday. The deal to pay and stay must mean that MTN believes the growth opportunities in Benin justified the higher fee, although political pressure from Mbeki will also have played a key role in persuading MTN to capitulate. Mbeki's direct approach to Benin's president has also resulted in a deal far more beneficial for MTN than the company would have been able to negotiate alone. The final settlement shows that there has been flexibility on both sides, with MTN winning the extended time frame as well as some potentially lucrative tax concessions. The initial ultimatum given by the regulatory authority was for MTN to pay the $52m difference between the old fee and the new fee for the right to continue operating. Yet that came with no extended licence period and no tax concessions. Nigeria’s Mtel Plans 3.3m Lines for Next YearActing Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Mtel, Ladi Williams, has announced plans by the new management of the company to raise its subscriber base from 750,000 to about 3.3 million by the middle of next year. Noting that the company was in a deplorable condition when he took over, he was, however, optimistic that it could still be turned around. Williams told newsmen in his office in Abuja last week, that as part of the drive to achieve that target, the Mtel brand and products would be relaunched next week. "We are soon going to take our fair share of the Nigerian market.Imagine that when we came in last April, the subscription base of Mtel has gone to as low as 100,000 from about 1.2 million last year, but we have already climbed above that and we will be hitting 750,000 lines by December and 3.3million lines by mid next year." He said that already Mtel has been able to recapture 40,000 subscribers in Kaduna and 16,000 in Abuja. Said he: "Test the quality of our network now and you will never experience congestion or drop call or all these problems everyone is complaining about. "On the workers' demand (for payment of wage arrears), he disclosed that management was offering to pay the junior members of staff of the company 50% of their outstanding one month salary and arears, and 25% for the middle level members of staff while management staff members would get no increase. (Source: This Day) Portugal Telecom’s new African subsidiary plans expansion in Kenya and NigeriaFollowing Portugal Telecom’s recent announcement that it has set up an African subsidiary and sold 22% of its shares to Nigerian VC company Helios, Balancing Act’s Selma Faria spoke to the Executive Director of the PT Group Joao Pedro Baptista, about its plans. Baptista stressed that the shareholding from Helios was not the best way to assess its likely “war chest” for investment. The company actually has access to credit up to US$460 million. Although the process of selecting an investment partner was a formal process, personal chemistry played a part:”There has been an evaluation of companies, after a detailed process of investigation. After that we created this short list of the companies that would best personify private equity investment, and would show the best knowledge of the geographic area in which we wanted to invest…and then there was also the human component of it, meaning relations have always been pleasant and clear”. Contrary to earlier reports in Expresso, the company will not restrict itself to Portuguese-speaking countries but will consciously be going out into English-speaking countries to “achieve a pan-African dimension. We have started with Namibia, Botswana and Nigeria, but we also have plans for Kenya”. It is particularly looking for countries where the company’s investment might benefit from economies of scale. Fears for Fate of Safaricom IPO As Kenyan Cabinet Delays Key ApprovalVodafone Plc of the UK, joint venture partners with Telkom Kenya in Safaricom Ltd, has expressed fears that delays by the Kenyan Cabinet in approving a critical agreement that must be signed before the planned initial public offer (IPO) of the mobile phone company can be put on the road, may render it impossible to float the shares of the company before December. Well-placed sources told The EastAfrican that the UK company has already registered its concerns with the government in a letter to the Minister for Finance, Amos Kimunya. It is not clear why the government has dragged its feet on the matter. But it would appear that a major factor has been the electioneering mood that has gripped the country, and the fact that the Cabinet has not been meeting as frequently as before. Without the Cabinet approval, the IPO implementation committee - the body steering the IPO process - is finding it difficult to proceed with any work, despite having already successfully procured IPO advisory services for the offer. Already, signs of stress on the IPO timetable are evident. Although the Treasury will not admit it, the delay in the signing and formal contracting of the IPO advisory services - won by a consortium led by local investment bankers, Dyer and Blair Ltd - has something to do with the delays in securing the approvals by the Cabinet. According to procedure, a due diligence on Safaricom Ltd will have to be conducted. The reporting accountants will also need time to do a fresh audit on the books of the company for a period stretching as far back as five years. More time will then be required to put the prospectus together, get it printed and then circulate it. Even more time will be required to put such a large IPO on offer - time for processing the applications, time for allocations and, finally, time for refunds. By the most conservative estimate, the Safaricom IPO process will need at least 12 weeks to complete from the time of formally contracting the advisors. Thus, the chances are that the IPO will last deep into the electioneering period - exposing the process to the risk of being overpoliticised. (Source: East African)
IN BRIEF:- Orange, the mobile brand of France Telecom is rolling out a new network in the Central African Republic for an initial investment of €20 million. According to CEO, Bruno Allassonnière, the service will be launched towards the end of 2007 and it will initially cover the East part of the country. The service will be extended to the West part of the country by the end of the first quarter of 2008. - The MTC group has decided to continue trading under the name of Celtel for the foreseeable future in its operations in Africa and will not switch to Zain, the bramd name it is using for its other operations. - Cisco Systems has set its eyes on the Angolan market through a partnership with the National Information Technology Commission (CNTI) aiming at the development of the country’s information technologies and communication. - Tunisia's reputation as a hub for call centers was reinforced at the news that Peugeot, the French car maker, will shift its European call centre based in Lyon, France, to Tunisia and Portugal. - Algeria’s Post and ICT Minister Boudjemaa Haichour unveiled that his department had received the first report, drafted by foreign experts, on how to introduce third and fourth generation mobile telephony in the country. 3G services will probably be launched in the middle of next year. TELECOMS, RATES, OFFERS AND COVERAGE- In Ghana, MTN has said that it will install 100 additional BTS per month to sustain growth in subscriber base which has increased from 2.7 million in 2006 to 3 million currently. - Zimbabwe’s phone operator NetOne will set up 52 Motorola base stations in Harare in a bid to ease network congestion in the capital. Some of the base stations are being re-deployed to Harare from the country's western region following the installation of new state-of-the-art base stations from a Chinese company Huaiwai, under a US$10 million credit financing supplier arrangement. - Warid Telecom, Uganda's fifth telecommunication service provider, has transmitted its first call at its head office in Kampala, paving way for the launch of their services in the near future. - Mozambique's main mobile phone operator M-Cel, a wholly owned subsidiary of incumbent TDM, has announced that it is increasing its prices by 12.4 per cent as from 1 October.
Togo connects to SAT3Togo and Benin can now boast of a telecommunications link between following the launch of a fibre optic cable linking the two countries. The ceremony was attended by the two country's heads of states who later paid a short visit to the signal centres. Togo will now be connected to the outside world via a fibre optic cable that will deliver voice, data, and video through a cable that is 165 km long that cuts through the city of Cotonou. The project was put together by Togo Telecom and the work lasted for 18 months costing 16 billion CFA (US$33 million) in total. . Togo began the process of digitalizing the country's telecommunications services as far back as 1992 and in 2003 started installing more than 750 km of optic fiber that offer more than 30.420 simultaneous communication services to Togolese homes. There are plans to connect the SAT3 landing station in Benin to Nigeria in order to give incumbent Nitel some redundancy but these have been held up by lack of money. (Source: Highway Africa News Agency) Wrangle Over Namibian Internet domainNamibia’s ICT alliance held a workshop last week on the regulatory framework surrounding the administration of Namibia's Internet domain. It set out to deal with the tricky issues of a domain name administration in private hands that charges comparatively high prices for access to .na domain names. The aim of the workshop in Windhoek is to prepare a strategy to deal with the administration of Namibia's country code domain, the .na Internet domain. In a statement, the ICT alliance said the issue needs input from all stakeholders. This includes Internet service providers, the present .na domain administrators, Website administrators and government representatives. The alliance said it also needed input from existing ICT alliance members, Afrispa represented by Eric Osiakwan, the ICT industry as a whole and existing public end-users of .na. Industry sources that wish to remain anonymous say controversy has surrounded Namibia's domain for a number of years now. The common practice in most other countries is that in the public interest a broad-based non-profit organisation controls the domain. In Namibia however Dr Eberhard Lisse, Dr Bennet Fuller and a third partner allegedly control the .na domain through their own close corporation for private profit. In the early days of the Internet in Namibia, Dr Lisse apparently saw a gap in the market and registered the .na domain in his own name. He is a gynaecologist by profession, but became interested in the Internet at its dawn and has since acquired considerable expertise in the field. The partners run the domain through the private company Ondis Internet Services cc., with information on the company available at www.ondis.co.na. Some industry sources however complain that the manner in which Ondis runs the domain has reduced the appeal of the .na domain for both service providers and the Namibian public. Sources New Era spoke to complained about the allegedly comparatively high cost of registering a site on Namibia's top-level domain. It costs an estimated US$8-10 to register a .com domain name (N$58 to N$72), whereas the cost of registering a Namibian domain runs as high as N$500. Industry sources complain about the fact that in Namibia, unlike in other countries, it is not possible to register a domain online. They see the process of registering a domain through Ondis Internet Services as too long and cumbersome. "Most people avoid the .na domain because of the problems they have experienced. Others however like a Namibian domain name because they want to be associated with the country," one source said. Several years ago interested parties attempted to change the status quo and unseat Ondis as the domain name administrator, but failed to gain any momentum. Personality clashes also seem part of the mix, with some describing Dr Lisse as an awkward and abrasive personality to deal with. Dr Bennet Fuller, who contrary to some reports is not a medical doctor, however strongly defended Ondis saying the dispute largely revolved around personal attacks on Dr Lisse. He denied that it takes long to register a Namibian domain name. "We always have a problem when it comes to invoicing. When the time comes to pay this suddenly always becomes an issue. Furthermore, a country domain cannot be run on the basis of personalities. We should not be making policy recommendations or changes in the law based on people's likes or dislikes of an individual," he said. Fuller further said the costs of registering an Internet domain name in Namibia is more or less equivalent to the cost in other small countries. Small countries of Namibia's size do not have the same economies of scale of bigger countries. He further disputed that it takes particularly long to register a domain name in Namibia. Applicants have to follow certain technical requirements to register a domain name, otherwise they cannot register the domain. "Many people try to do it without meeting the technical requirements. If people don't know what they are doing it takes a long time," he said. Ondis is currently cooperating with the administrator of the Czech Republic country domain to develop software that will allow online domain name registration in Namibia. Fuller said Ondis Internet Services would not participate in the ICT Alliance workshop because the alliance allegedly never invited them - even though it mentions them as a stakeholder "We hear their modus operandi is to make proposals without consulting us so that we should have no opportunity to respond." He further challenged the argument that Ondis has held back the development of Namibia's country domain name. "It's true that Namibia has only 1,500 to 2,000 domain names registered while South Africa has 200,000 to 300,000, but then Namibia's entire population is not much bigger than Johannesburg's Soweto township." Fuller said that when the ICT Alliance called a similar meeting some years ago, Ondis said it was willing to meet them. They however requested that before the meeting takes place, the ICT Alliance provide them with a list of its members and its Articles of Association. "They replied, but without ever providing us with their bona fides. From what we see their strategy is not to engage us, but rather to exert political pressure." He pointed out that Dr Lisse is Chairperson of the committee appointed by the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to develop best practice for country code domains. "He must know something. They complain that he has rules, but he has rules for a reason, without which the Internet would not function properly." (Source: New Era) Has South Africa’s Minister backtracked on SAT3 exclusivity?Not for the first time, South Africans are wondering whether their Government – which has made much of its insistence on South African ownership of new landing stations - is actually serious about doing something about the country’s SAT3 monopoly. Outsiders might observe that it is always easier to tackle the problem you don’t yet have than the one you do. Industry players and consumers welcomed the Minister’s policy directive to declare all SAT-3 exclusivity agreements null and void, but has she backtracked on this initiative? Communications Minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri announced earlier this year that ‘as from November 1, 2007 all exclusivity provisions contained in the SAT-3 agreements shall be declared null and void in South Africa.’ This was widely welcomed by both industry players and consumers, who are hoping that competition on SAT-3 will result in lower international bandwidth rates and ultimately more affordable broadband services. In the initial notice, inviting comments on proposed Policies and Policy Directions published in Government Gazette 29923 on 25 May 2007, the Minister clearly stated under the heading ‘International Terrestrial and Submarine Cable’ that: “I have taken the policy decision, in terms of section 43 (11) of the ECA to consult with relevant governments of the SAT-3 consortium members indicating 1st November 2007 as the date from when the exclusivity provisions contained in the SAT-3 agreements or arrangements entered into shall be declared null and void in South Africa.” In the final policy directives published on 17 September the SAT-3 exclusivity directive is ominously absent from the document. In the Government Gazette No. 30308, the Policies and Policy Directions as Drafted in terms of Section 3(1) and (2) of the Electronic Communications Act, 2005 (Act No. 36 of 2005) were published. The absence of the SAT-3 Exclusivity directive from this document raises questions as to whether the SAT-3 exclusivity enjoyed by Telkom - which is widely seen as the main reason for the high international bandwidth costs in South Africa – will continue uncontested. Matsepe-Casaburri was severely criticized for her recent announcements that SAT-3 competitors SEACOM and EASSy may be prohibited from landing their cables in South Africa. These latest developments only serve to undermine any remaining trust that the public may have that the Department of Communications is doing its best to introduce competition in South Africa. (Source: MyBroadband) IN BRIEF:- The Kenya government will pre-qualify at least three operators to participate in the provision of connectivity to digital villages under the Digital Village Project, to Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) enterprises, to the e-government project and to universities and colleges throughout the country. - Thirty-two rural districts in Uganda can now access the Internet after the deployment of Internet post office protocols used to retrieve emails from a mail server in the areas. MTN and uganda telecom deployed the protocols after receiving funding of US$698,355 and US$280,800 respectively from the World Bank, Arthur Muhangi of the Uganda Communications Commission said - In South Africa, the Department of Communications has gazetted amendments to the Electronic Communications (EC) Act. These amendments are aimed at smoothing out the licence process for Infraco, although the department does not explicitly say so. - “Djaweb”, the Internet subsidiary of Algerie Telecom has launched ADSL2+. The company has initially commissioned 129,192 lines – 119,000 for ADSL2+ and 8,000 lines for SHDSL. The roll out of super fast broadband has been carried out by Alcatel-Lucent for an investment ofUS$15.5 million.
Zinox, Intel, Microsoft to Empower Students in NigeriaIn a bid to promote the use of computers among students in the country, Zinox, Intel and Microsoft have formed a partnership that will empower 100,000 Nigerian students this season through Z-SCOP (Zinox Student' Computer Ownership Project). The partnership, according to Leo Stan Ekeh, Chairman of Zinox Computers, "is a robust initiative aimed at promoting the use of computers by our students (from primary to postgraduate level, including graduates serving their NYSC)". Ekeh disclosed that Z-SCOP was targeting in the first phase at least 100,000 students in Nigerian institutions of learning who will acquire either laptops or desktops at highly discounted prices and zero interest rate with full warranty. In his presentation at the event, Leo Stan Ekeh explained that the first phase will see 100,000 students get computers. The Chairman reported that Intel, Microsoft and Zinox were expecting a multiplier effect in the short run that would lead to 500,000 students owning laptops and desktops in the first year. He informed the launch audience that, subsequently, as many as 1 million Nigerian students could be computerized yearly by the partnership. The Chairman, Zinox Computers, declared that the momentum for the Z-SCOP was gained from the current promotion of Computer acquisition amongst staff of educational institutions through the instalment payment scheme. He also said that there are a number of MOUs that support this vision including the FGN/NUC/CNP, the Afrihub-Zinox, the Galaxy, and the ICT implementation MOUs for Federal educational institutions. He further explained that students can take advantage of this offer in three categories. In the first category students who pay upfront into our dedicated bank accounts across the nation or through their respective school authorities. Qualified students will enjoy a 10% discount from our current prices for laptops and a 7% discount on desktops. Zinox shall charge N2500 for deliveries outside Lagos, Abuja, and Port Harcourt. In the second category, those student who are unable to pay in full, but can pay at least 10% to confirm the order will enjoy a 3% discount on our current prices and enjoy zero interest rate for the six months they are allowed to pay the balance. All we require from their parents are postdated cheques. The third category is for those who want to pay in twelve equal installments after a payment of 20% deposit with confirmed order. Qualified students under this scheme shall not pay any interest. All they have to supply are postdated cheques from their parents. Payment can be made in any branch of the three banks partnering with Zinox. (Source: This Day) HP leads the way on resolving electronic recycling challenges in AfricaHP last week announced the launch of a project with the Global Digital Solidarity Fund (DSF) and the Swiss Institute for Materials Science and Technology (Empa) to address the growing problem of electronic waste in Africa. This collaboration aims to both reduce potential health and environmental hazards caused by improper disposal of electronic waste and create jobs in disadvantaged communities. As IT use and its contribution to economic growth in Africa increases, so too does the amount of electronic waste. Whilst electronic equipment is harmless during its life, the presence of substances like mercury and lead can pose risks if it is incorrectly recycled. Yet, valuable substances, such as gold and copper, can be harvested from old electronic goods. This has spawned an efficient informal sector which recycles much of this waste. To tackle this problem HP, DSF and Empa are undertaking analysis and providing support for improved recycling processes over the coming year. The project aims to develop a blueprint for electronic waste management in Africa in conjunction with existing recycling schemes, with the proposal for large scale deployment due in December 2008. The initial phase consists of a pilot project in South Africa together with an analysis of existing practices in Morocco, Kenya and Tunisia. “We see this project as a means to help develop an infrastructure to safely deal with electronic waste based on local habits and structures’’, said Klaus Hieronymi, heading the HP Environment Business Management Organisation for HP Europe Middle East and Africa. “We hope that this initial analysis will enable us to create a widespread public private partnership (PPP) that will not only improve health and environmental standards, but also help disadvantaged communities by promoting skills and creating jobs.” “This issue requires a specifically tailored solution. Given the number of people involved in the informal sector we are looking to develop effective methods of dealing with waste that will allow this sector to flourish in a safe and sustainable manner,” said Dr. Mathias Schluep, project manager for Sustainable Technology Cooperation from Empa. South African Student coder talks on Joomla, GoogleCharl van Niekerk, a student living in George, earlier this year became the first South African to participate in the Google Summer of Code (GSoC). Tectonic caught up with him to find out how the project went and about his subsequently joining the Joomla Development Working Group. Tectonic last spoke to him in April when his project proposal had been accepted and the the GSoC was just getting started. The focus of his project was on making Joomla better compliant with web standards by cleaning up the code that Joomla generated so that there was as little possible semantic abuse hindering accessibility. (click here for article) Unlike many of the other projects run during the GSoC, Van Niekerk was the only person working on his particular project. Aside from the guidance of his mentor, he said that he mainly worked in isolation, thereby missing out on the experience of collaborating with others across the world. "It was more work than I thought," he said, when asked about the experience. He admitted that he was a little disappointed at first in that he did not receive as much feedback as he hoped for, but this changed as the GSoC drew near its end. The mailing lists between the students involved with the GSoC were quite active at the beginning and end of the project, but during the middle they were were much quieter - which he attributed to the fact that everyone was busy with coding at that point. As a result of his work, he was invited to join the Joomla Development Working Group. Together with "around four" other Summer coders, Van Niekerk joined the team at the beginning of September. Still quite new to the team, he has not yet been able to focus on his core interest in improving web standards, as the team is busy on the last stages of the release candidate for version 1.5. Much of his work has been on bug fixes as they finish off the code to be released in the next few months. He is eager to begin working on his particular field when development begins for the next version. Although the team has not started talking about it yet, he expects that it will be version 1.6. Van Niekerk explained that there are about 19 people in the team, spanning all across the world. The communication between them is quite active and although he has never spoken to any of his fellow developers, they are in regular email and IRC contact. As part of the team, he is expected to put in at least 8 hours a week of coding time, which he normally does in the evenings. Aside from developing this internationally acclaimed piece of software, he is still completing his third year of Software Engineering at Unisa and has begun hitting the books for exams in October and November. Next year he hopes to continue with honours and keep on with the projects he has become involved in. (source: Tectonic) IN BRIEF:-Nigeria's IT solution providers, Digitplus Nigeria Limited has signed up with Taiwan based Twinmos Technology. The deal, according to a statement, would see the Nigerian company in partnership with Twinmos selling different suites of hardware solutions to meet the need of corporate players in West Africa's biggest technology market. - Kenya's premier referral hospital requires Sh350 million (US$5.2 million) to complete its computerisation programme. - US PC maker, Dell Inc, will soon open a Nigerian operation. Akin Banuso, is to head the Dell Nigeria office plans to deepen its local market share like fellow US technology companies like Microsoft Nigeria, HP West Africa, IBM, Cisco Systems West Africa, which among others, have a direct Nigeria presence. - A new website, the Free Knowledge for ICT Literacy Portal, has been launched to offer an information resource on free, libre and open source software (FLOSS) with particular reference to the non-governmental organisation (NGO) sector.
Botswana’a BTC sees profits slump as costs go back upAlthough Botswana incumbent BTC saw its turnover go up, costs rose ahead of increased income and saw it achieve a much lower level of profit in he run-up to launching its new mobile service. BTC saw its turnover for the period ended 31 March 2007 jump from P739.1 million (US$121 million) in the same period last year to P803.4 million (US$132 million). However, the parastatal's net profits were down 15.1 percent from P138.7 million (US$22.8 million) in 2006 to P117.8 million (US$19.4 million) largely due to high operating costs. Total expenditure went up to P287.6 million from P223.3 million in the same period last year while total assets ballooned by P34.4 million to P1.6 billion. BTC's new growth path follows the transformation it underwent in 2004 after it engaged Irish Development International (IDI) consultants to turn the loss-making parastatal around. The strategy, which was spearheaded by Noel Herrrity (now running Zantel), entailed the retrenchment of 600 employees. It paid off immediately when the BTC reported a profit of P36. 2 million for 2004 from the previous year's loss of P11 million widely blamed on a customer exodus resulting from a controversial billing system bought and installed at the cost of P60 million (which failed to work for several months) and new competition from mobile phone companies. The corporation's financial statements revealed that BTC management welcomed the award of Public Telecommunication Operator (PTO) licences that would see BTC competing with Orange and Mascom. The PTO licences allow the BTC, Mascom Wireless Botswana and Orange Botswana to offer mobile telephony, fixed telephony and Internet services all under one licence. (Source: Mmegi/The Reporter) South Africa’s State IT Agency Turns Corner with Profit Up by 76%Rocky years for the State Information Technology Agency (Sita) have been put behind it, with the government's hi-tech supplier earning a net profit 76% higher than it managed last year. Figures showing a R143,5m profit on turnover up 15% to R3,3bn will do a lot to finally bury Sita's reputation for incompetence, poor performance, negligence and possible corruption that marred its earlier years. The turnaround was largely attributed to an overhaul instigated by former CEO Mavuso Msimang -- who has since been recruited to achieve a similar shake-up at the problematic Home Affairs Department. The agency still needs a full-time CEO, is having its board reshaped and may see its workload altered as the Sita Act that defines its duties is reviewed. But Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said: "I am proud of the progress and accomplishments Sita has recorded during the financial year and look forward to even greater successes in the year ahead." The last remnants of the old Sita are three-year-old cases of negligence at best and fraud at worst that are still being investigated. One was the awarding of a contract where "the costs incurred were completely over the top for the services we got", said Sita's acting CEO, Peter Pedlar. Charges were being laid, he said, because "we want to catch the culprits associated with wrongdoing". The Commercial Crime Unit is investigating a second case involving contracts worth R61m to protect ministers and top-ranking government employees, since the people using it never paid for the service. "We are discussing that with the Presidency because users must pay for what they want," Pedlar said. Long-standing complaints from private sector companies that Sita was slow to award government IT tenders were fading. Tenders were now adjudicated in an average of 78 days, down from the intolerable six months they used to take, said Pedlar. There was room to speed that up even more, as long as the process remained thorough enough to withstand scrutiny from outsiders or from aggrieved losing bidders. (Source: Business Day) Nigeria’s PNN to get US$4 million to develop servicesPrivate Networks Nigeria Limited (PNN), an NCC licensed telecommunications company, set up to provide various telecoms services in the communications sector and the winner of the Best Value Added Service Provider for Year 2004, at the Nigerian Telecoms Awards, has announced that it has secured additional funding for her operations from Aureos West Africa Fund (AWAF). AWAF is injecting Four million dollars (USD 4 Million) into PNN to expand her operational base as well as introduce various new innovative service offerings. Speaking at a media parlay recently, Alhaji AbdulRahman-Abiola-Odunowo(AJ) confirmed that the investment of AWAF in PNN will further position PNN in taking leadership position in her 4 core areas of operations. "As you are aware, PNN has been in the fore front of providing integrated site maintenance within the telecommunications sector since 2003. With this investment, PNN will now be able to expand its capacity to effectively manage between 2,000 and 3,000 BTS within Nigeria and West African sub region. Also, PNN will in the nearest future be offering sales of mobile phones and accessories in the One hundred and Five (105) retail outlets it will be opening during the next 12 months" Also speaking at the media event, Jacob Kholi, the Managing Partner for Aureos West Africa Jacob Kholi, the Managing Partner of the AWAF, said that the investment in PNN fits well with its portfolio strategy of identifying and investing in companies that have strong fundamentals in their respective industries. He noted that the investment will strengthen the company ahead of its competitors to enable it take advantage of the many opportunities in the telecoms services sector and facilitate the generation of good returns to all stakeholders. (Source: This Day) Uganda’s technology park to get a boost through tax incentivesThe Commonwealth Business Council has asked for tax exemptions for the planned information technology (IT) park, "To achieve the objective of a thriving IT park, the council has suggested an IT policy framework including 100% tax exemption for the lease income, capital gains and services provided in the park for 20 years from commencement," a statement from the council said. The council also suggested 100% tax exemption on companies and staff located in the IT park for 20 years from commencement, simplified and quick clearances of work permits for IT staff and no restriction on repatriation of profits/salaries. It also wants 100% duty exemption on capital equipment imports into the park. (Source: New Vision) IN BRIEF:- Neneh Macdouall Gaye, the Gambian Secretary of State for Communication, Information and Technology told the National Assembly that the Government decided to sell its shares in Gamtel/Gamcel due to deterioration of services over the years. The Government of The Gambia has decided to find a strategic partner for Gamtel/Gamcel so as to inject the necessary capital to increase coverage and improve quality of service. However the sales of the telco incumbent to the almost unknown Lebanese company Spectrum remains controversial as there was no bidding process involved. - Westcon, a distributor of converged communications has acquired a majority stake in Sparnoon-Dynatech. The acquisition reaffirms the company's position as the largest distributor of Cisco products in Nigeria and other countries of the in Sub-Saharan Africa, giving it an estimated 65 per cent share of the distribution market.
Over 6,000 tender announcements downloaded from Eastern African tender websitesThe websites www.tender.co.tz; www.tender.co.ug and www.tender.co.ke were launched on 15th September, 2006. They are niche websites that consolidate all tender announcements in East Africa in print and other media in an easily accessible format online. In the one year since their launch they have established a clear user-ship base with the follow: over 1,000 registered users spanning 35 countries and over 11,000 tender announcements available online since October, 2006. But not only do they have a critical mass of announcements but over 6,666 tender announcements have been downloaded. One of the site’s features is its alert system where members are sent a “tender alert” every time a tender in their industry category is uploaded. It covers tender announcements from Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and when possible Rwanda, Burundi, Somalia and Sudan. Although subscription based, the three sites offer a free 30 day trial prior to full subscription. Funafric Launches music and video website in LagosA website known as funafric, one of the first African music and video download service, has been launched in Lagos. The site will provide a unique platform for African music and videos on its website, www.funafric.com. During a demonstration at a news conference in Lagos, the General Manager, Funafric, Aramide Paul-Taiwo, said major recording labels like premier records, Sony music, Westside Music, Storm Records and other independent organisations have already signed up for the service and their catalogues have been uploaded, adding that currently, Funafric is in the process of signing up recording labels in other African countries to boost the wide appeal of the platform. Said she: "Now African has a voice on the World Wide Web and that voice is www.funafric.com". The company says that it hhas reached rights agreements covering both Nigeria and the UK. The spokesman for Funafric, and one of the directors, Ayo Bankole, explained that Funafric is the outcome of two years of hard work by web developers, business managers, internationals payment platforms, records labels collecting societies, artistes, banks, lawyers and other stakeholders in the industry. According to him, www.funafric.com is now the number one destination for African music and videos on the internet. He explained that customers can now buy music by using their MasterCard, Visa card or Inter-switch card safely on the Internet. With huge investments in robust digital security protocols to ensure that the cardholders can use his card safely and that the music and video are protected, Funafric's operation is also open to right owners to monitor their content. (Source: Leadership) Feedelix launches Ethiopian agricultural pricing systemFeedelix Wireless Inc., a provider of SMS/Mobile IM solutions for non-Latin scripts last week announced results from its recently deployed BoonaNET project in five locations in Ethiopia using an integrated mobile phone and web-based system for agricultural commodity price information. According to Feedelix Wireless, the results indicate that the country’s farmers in key agricultural product growing areas are ready to embrace modern technology to get equitable prices for their products. Coming in a period where Ethiopia is currently experiencing a runaway inflation in core food items and grains such as Teff (the grain that forms the staple food in the country, Injera), Berbere (red pepper), and sesame seeds, Feedelix’s first integrated Ethiopic-script based commodity price information system is proving useful in providing real-time market information for farmers, traders, economists, and interested policy makers. In a project that was launched in early August of 2007, Feedelix set-up a team of agricultural price information data collectors in key coffee, Teff and red pepper (Berbere) growing regions. The data collectors subsequently fed the price information to Feedelix servers through an integrated system that consisted Ethiopic script interface with SMS (for IP enabled phones) and web-based instant messaging (IM). Similar data on key commodity price information was collected from the country’s main grain market in Addis Ababa in Mesalemiya and then fed to the database on a daily basis. The data was subsequently compiled and processed at the end of the working day. A price manifesto of prices at Addis Ababa and the rural areas is then published and sent back to the farmers through the data collectors. The price manifesto were then printed and posted at convenient location in the five regional centers such as Internet cafes and cooperative offices. “This project demonstrated that in some locations such as Alaba in the Ethiopian Rift Valley, the availability of real-time market information was believed to demonstrate an adjustment in the price of red pepper, the region’s most important commodity,” said Ashenafi Assefa, the associate project leader for BoonaNET. Assefa indicated that the market for red pepper (Berbere) in Ethiopia is currently experiencing very large price increases due to speculations and a multitude of reasons not clear even to professionals in the commodities market. However, Feedelix’s project was the only technology available to determine the increase in price at the source – before the effect on the Addis Ababa market was felt. Mr. Assefa added that it took a full 48 hours before the traders in Addis Ababa increased their Berbere prices after the Alaba traders already hiker their prices. “Feedelix would like to make this tool available in different agricultural regions of the country to provide an efficient and useful modern technological tool that can empower farmers to make informed decisions regarding the price of their agricultural commodities,” said Ashenafi Assefa. FeedelSMS is an easily downloadable, self-contained, and interoperable application. The open architecture the developers envisioned allows users to download FeedelSMS on any handset across any system (GSM, CDMA) and across a multitude of wireless carriers around the world. The quick one-step download coupled with existing key board mapping gives the users the comfort to utilize the product right away.
PEOPLE- Laciné Diaby has been appointed as the new CEO of Moov Gabon. - Lamia Cheffai-Sghaier will be heading the l’Agence Tunisienne d’Internet (ATI) - Joseph Ged has started to take charge of the Ndjema, the Algerian mobile subsidiary of Wataniya Telecom. - Victor Lawrence, Ekwow Spio-Garbrah and Reitumetse Jackie Huntley have been appointed to the board of Telkom South Africa. JOBS AND OPPORTUNITIESGlobal Technology Donations Specialist, TechSoup Global If you have experience in administering technology product donations or are a legal or operations professional with a strong track record who would like to leverage your talents to better the world, we may have the position for you. We are seeking a talented, enthusiastic, socially minded individual to manage the eligibility rules of our global program. You will play a key role in developing the strategies to grow efficiently while maximizing our impact on global civil society. We can't offer you everything you're worth, but if you are interested in challenging projects, international exposure, and making a difference in the world, this could be the job of a lifetime! For further information contact TSSGlobalJobs@compumentor.org EVENTS- ICT AFRICA 2007 October 1-5, 2007, Kenyatta International Conference Centre, Nairobi, Kenya ICT Africa is an annual continental information and communications technology conference addressing all aspects of ICT development in Africa. The conference is convened by NEPAD council in collaboration with the NEPAD Kenya secretariat. The 2007 event will be organized by Global Conferences, Cape Town, South Africa. For further information contact rjacobs@globalconf.co.za - INFRASTRUCTURE PARTNERSHIPS FOR AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT (IPAD) CENTRAL AFRICA 3rd - 5th October, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo iPAD Central Africa 2006 provides an opportunity to network directly with key partners. The event aims to facilitate regional planning and collaborations under one roof between government, the public sector and business. iPAD Central Africa 2006 is a one-stop-shop for investigating investment opportunities in DRC and the Central African region as a whole. For further information visit http://www.spintelligent-events.com/ipad-central2006/en/ USING ICT FOR EFFECTIVE DISASTER MANAGEMENT – AFRICA FORUM 2007 13th – 15th November 2007, Dar es Salaam International Conference Centre, Tanzania The use of ICTs in disaster management is one of the CTO’s core areas of expertise. Following successful events in Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific, we are delighted to deliver our fourth regional ICTs for Effective Disaster Management Forum in Tanzania. There is no admission fee and we hope that all disaster management stakeholders will be able to attend and contribute to this event’s success. With the Ministry of Communications and the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority as hosts, as well as the potential of a half-day workshop conducted by the ITU, this event has already attracted a huge amount of interest. For further information contact Mr. Salim Binbrek at the CTO on Tel: +44 208 834 1592 or Email: s.binbrek@cto.int. For more information please see the CTO website http://www.cto.int - The EuroAfrica-ICT initiative upcoming events. 8-9 October, Gaborone, Botswana 11-12 October, Yaoundé, Cameroon The EuroAfrica-ICT initiative is organising its 5th and 6th awareness workshops in sub-Saharan Africa (,). These workshops specifically aim at supporting the development of a deeper and broader Scientific and Technological cooperation between the European Union and sub-Saharan Africa in the ICT sector. For further information visit http://www.euroafrica-ict.org CONTRACTS: WHO'S SELLING WHAT TO WHOM?Angola Telecom and Ericsson - Angola Angola Telecom has selected Ericsson to be the sole supplier of a fibre-optic submarine network linking six coastal provinces in Angola for total budget of US $70 million. The network, which is to be known as 'ADONES' (Angola Domestic Network System), will cover almost the entire length of Angola's 1,600 km coastline from Cabinda province in the North to Namibe in the South and will be used to deliver superior telecommunications and connectivity to the region.
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