South Africa faced an over 17-year delay in releasing new radio frequency spectrum. To address that failure, the ANC wants to align future assignments with the International Telecommunications Union’s schedule.
This was according to communications minister Khubudzo Ntshavheni, who was addressing media during a briefing at the ANC’s 6th National Policy Conference on Sunday.
Ntshavheni insisted that she was not speaking as a cabinet minister but as rapporteur of a commission at the conference. She is also “a serious comrade” considered an expert on media and ICT, Ntshavheni said.
Spectrum is the raw wireless network capacity that cellular operators use to communicate between their towers and mobile devices.
In addition to ensuring timely issuing of spectrum, the ANC said future assignments should be used for other industries, not only mobile telecommunication.
“We are going to do further assignments of the spectrum and licensing,” Ntshavheni said.
“That spectrum must not be used only for mobile telecommunication. It must be used in agriculture, health, education, mining, and other sectors,” Ntshavheni said. It should also be used to introduce new industries.
Ntshavheni said that the state digital infrastructure company (SDIC) is close to being established.
The ANC’s policy echoed the minister’s recent announcement that the SDIC should be awarded spectrum.
This would enable the participation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), said Ntshavheni.
The ANC also believes government’s fibre infrastructure should be consolidated.
Ntshavheni said SME participation would help roll out fibre to rural areas and improve universal access to connectivity.
“We must make sure that there is universal access to connectivity and ensure that fibre-to-the-home deployment is possible,” Ntshavheni added.
The idea behind giving the SDIC spectrum is to offer smaller service providers access to cellular network infrastructure built by a neutral wholesaler rather than commercial operators like Vodacom and MTN.
In June 2022, Ntshavheni announced the establishment of the SDIC, saying that South Africa cannot leave its technological fate in the hands of commercially-driven telecommunications operators.
“We hold as a department and government a State Digital Infrastructure Company that has a responsibility to make sure that all South Africans have access to technology,” she added.
Ntshavheni’s announcement added a different perspective to a cabinet statement from March 2022, which created the impression that government was shelving its plans for a national wholesale open-access network (WOAN).
However, it now appears that government is merely substituting a WOAN for the SDIC, which is essentially a merger of Sentech and Broadband Infraco’s networks.
The SDIC will have access to the excess capacity of government-funded ICT infrastructure, including the telecommunications networks of several state-owned companies, including Eskom, Sanral, and Transnet.
The communications minister revealed that her department aimed to release a new spectrum policy— which would indicate a spectrum provision for the SDIC — by the end of July.
Cellular industry experts have warned that a neutral wireless network wholesaler is technically infeasible.
