MTN Makes Changes in Africa Team

South Africa's MTN Group has shuffled its key management in its African subsidiaries. MTN Group President and CEO, Mr Phuthuma Nhleko, says these appointments will go a long way towards helping MTN to achieve its vision of being the leading telecoms player in emerging markets.

“An appropriate degree of mobility of staff between our various operations facilitates increased learnings across the business and provides our staff with attractive and meaningful opportunities for growth within emerging markets. Over time, this should further bolster our ability to attract and retain the best skill and capability across our footprint,” says Nhleko.

Mr Themba Khumalo, the current CEO of MTN Rwanda is to take over as the new CEO of MTN Uganda. Previously Khumalo was an executive at MTN South Africa before his appointment as CEO of MTN Swaziland.

Mr Khaled Mikkawi, former CEO of the MTN operation in Liberia, will become the CEO of MTN Rwanda. Mikkawi was with Investcom for nine years before the company was acquired by MTN in 2006.

Mr Erik van Veen, the current COO of MTN Uganda, is the new CEO of MTN Zambia.

In the West and Central Africa region (WECA), MTN Guinea Bissau CEO, Mr Frans Joubert, has been appointed CEO of MTN’s operation in Liberia. Mr Anthony Masozera, the current CFO for MTN Rwanda, will become the new CEO of MTN Guinea Bissau. Mr Wim Vanhelleputte has been appointed CEO of MTN Côte d’Ivoire. Vanhelleputte joined MTN from another mobile operator where he served as CEO.

Orascom Loses MobiNil Case To France Telecom

­Orascom Telecom has lost a legal action and been ordered to sell its entire stake in Egypt's MobiNil to France Telecom. In 2007 Orascom Telecom initiated an arbitration against France Telecom at the Arbitration Court of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) to try and force France Telecom to transfer its MobiNil shares to Orascom Telecom.

There have been strained relations between Orascom and France Telecom, with the latter initiating the legal action against FT in December 2007 due to disagreement over the strategy for MobiNil. 

The Arbitration Court has rejected Orascom Telecom’s claims and then turned the matter on its head and ordered it to transfer a large stake in MobiNil to France Telecom instead.

France Telecom says that it will be paying approximately €530 million, and will have full control over the leading mobile operator in Egypt. France Telecom will therefore be able to consolidate the entire financial results of ECMS. On the basis of the 2008 results, this represents additional annual revenues of over €360 million and EBITDA of €165 million.

The holding in the company is slightly complex.

The mobile phone network - which trades as MobiNil - is owned by a holding firm, ECMS - which is in turn owned by three parties, 20% directly by Orascom Telecom, 29% via the stock exchange and the remaining 51% is owned by a company, confusingly called MobiNil.

This holding company is in turn 71.25% owned by France Telecom and 28.75% owned by Orascom Telecom. The court ruling applies only to Orascom Telecom's 28.75% in the holding company.

After the order is carried out, France Telecom will end up with sole ownership of the holding company, and hence have a 51% ownership of the mobile network. Orascom Telecom will retain its 20% direct stake in the mobile network, and the stock market float will be unaffected.

The company is the largest operator in the market, and according to figures from the Mobile World database, has a market share of around 48%.

Egypts Lifts Ban on GPS phone

The Egyptian government has lifted the ban on GPS mobile phones in the country. The National Telecommunication Regulatory Auhtority agreed in a meeting with the ICT ministry to allow the import of cars, phones and other devices with civilian GPS and navigation applications.

The devices will still be subject to certain NTRA technical requirements. Customs officials have already been informed of the change.

Telkom Introduces Mobile Service

South African fixed-line operator Telkom has launched its new Mobi service, offering mobile voice services over its WCDMA network. The company already offered data services on the mobile network and has now introduced voice after finalising a deal to spin off its stake in mobile operator Vodacom.

Telkom Mobi offers five service options: prepaid, everyday off-peak, mobile 200, mobi 300 and mobi 500. The prepaid start pack costs ZAR 149 and comes with 15 minutes and 30 SMS. The cost for calls to the Telkom network is ZAR 1.99 per minute during peak times and ZAR 0.89 off-peak times, while peak-time calls to mobile networks are ZAR 2.29 per minute and off-peak calls cost ZAR 1.39. The Telkom Mobi Everyday Off-Peak service carries a monthly subscription fee of ZAR 109 and provides subscribers with 150 off-peak minutes, 30 SMS per month and 25 MB of data.

The three postpaid plans cost ZAR 279, ZAR 389 and ZAR 545 for respectively 200, 300 or 500 minutes per month. The plans also come with monthly SMS and data bundles. The mobile service is currently available in Gauteng and Cape Town. 

Women Activists in Uganda Reject Phone Tapping Bill

The proposed telephone tapping bill by the Ugandan authorities will increase domestic violence; women activists in Uganda have warned.

The activists insist that passing the Regulation of Interception of Communications Bill in its current form will increase violence against women.

The activists, under the Uganda Women Network (UWONET) statement on Thursday said currently there are cases of violence against women perpetuated by their husbands, who illegally access their spouse’s telephone records from communication service providers.

UWONET officials, who met the Parliamentary Committee on Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) considering the Regulation of Interception of Communications Bill, 2007, on Thursday asked legislators to be sensitive on how women will be protected so as to minimize domestic violence.

The Regulation of Interception of Communications Bill, 2007 intends to make provision for the lawful interception and monitoring of certain communications in the course of their transmission through a telecommunication, postal or related service system in Uganda. The Bill also seeks to provide for the establishment of a Communications Monitoring Centre in Uganda.

Legislators asked why the women activists were against giving the mandate to sanction communication interception to the Minister of Security whereas it is the practice around the world.

Mr. David Bahati, a parliamentarian said the Bill was focusing on national and economic interests of the country, rather than on individuals.

The UWONET officials said interception of communication would tantamount to invasion of individuals’ privacy guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Constitution.

Rita Aciro of UWONET said, “Whereas it is true that certain restrictions are permissible for public safety and security, it is also true that some of the worst human rights violations have been committed in the pretext of such derogations.

“Therefore it is important that such derogations are strictly crafted and monitored so that they do not serve as a smokescreen for the violation of human rights.”

She added that the Bill needs to be in tandem with other laws including the Communications Act to ensure a uniform practice across all government agencies preying into the privacy of individuals.

UWONET recommended that permission to authorize interception of communication be given to a senior judge to safeguard against abuse of the interception.

Aciro said, “The order should indicate the kind of communication which is to be tapped and when the need for that information ceases to be.”

She said the information gathered should not be used as evidence in court, but rather for following up investigations, and that it should never be made public.

The officials said items in the Bill would be handled by amending other laws like the Prevention of Terrorism Act instead of bringing up a new law.

UWONET is an advocacy coalition of 17 national women’s NGOs and institutions and individuals in Uganda.

Econet Refutes MTN Interest In Yu

Econet Wireless Kenya, which trades under the Yu brandname, has refuted local media reports that South Africa's MTN has offered US$450 for a stake in the company. The reports are “rumors,” Chief Executive Officer Srinivasa Iyengar told reporters in Nairobi. The story emerged in Kenya's Standard newspaper.

The claimed price being offered by MTN coincidentally matches the US$450 million in debt the network recently raised to fund its rollout plan.

Last year, Econet Wireless International (EWI) sold a 49% stake in the company to India's Essar Communications Holdings (ECHL). The companies said that the move would significantly benefit Econet Wireless Kenya (EWK), which is 70% owned by EWI, from a rollout as well as product offering perspective.

“Econet is not for sale,” Iyengar added. “Essar is a partner for life.” Econet Kenya will change its name to Essar Telecom Kenya Ltd., he concluded.

The network operator was recently reported to have signed up 200,000 subscribers since it launched last November - and is aiming for one million customers by the middle of the year.

Figures from the Mobile World database subscriber database reports that Safaricom is the market leader with a market share of 82.3% with Celtel coming in at 17.6%. Telkom Kenya (Orange) has just started a "mobile" type service. The country itself has a population penetration level of 36%.

The regulator has recently announced that it will make a second attempt at launching mobile number portability - which traditionally benefits new entrants into markets.

Africa Capex to Decline by 11.8% During 2009

­African wireless capital expenditure spending is forecasted to decline 11.8% in 2009 after growing 16.4% in 2008, according to the latest report from EJL Wireless Research.

"The spending levels for wireless capital expenditures have been sequentially increasing for the first three quarters of 2008 but declined in Q4. Regionally, both the North and South Africa regions declined in 2008 on a year over year basis. With a mobile penetration rate of 35.7% in Africa at the end of 2008, we believe that it will be tougher for mobile operators going forward to make money as APRU continues to decline," says founder and President, Earl Lum.

"Given the economic uncertainty, wireless capital expenditure spending by most of the major wireless operators in Africa will decline in 2009 when compared with 2008. We expect a brief market recovery in 2010 and then a more moderate decline in 2011. The economic uncertainty may also lead to more operator consolidation over the next several years," says Lum.

Glo Mobile Blames Environment Body for Delay in Ghana Roll-out

Ghana's newest mobile network operator, Glo Mobile has complained that it is suffering problems in rolling out its network due to delays in securing permission from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to install its towers.

Glo Mobile is owned by Nigeria's Globalcom and was awarded a GSM operator license last June.

Mr Idowu Olumodeji, Head of Technical-Rollout at Glo, told the Ghana News Agency that the company had had to push back deadlines several times because the EPA had not issued permits for masts. He noted that to date Glo Mobile had submitted over 500 applications for permits to mount masts and other infrastructure in most of the regional capitals, but EPA was yet to issue a single permit.

Mr Olumodeji, who sounded frustrated, said Glo had asked EPA not to wait for all the applications to be complete but to issue permits for those which were complete but the EPA had not been co-operative on that either.

Mr Olumodeji said Glo had millions of dollars worth of equipment sitting at its warehouse waiting to be deployed - as soon as the EPA issues the permits.

For its part, the EPA has only just completed a draft document on the rules for installing base station towers in the country. The document, seen by the GNA calls for more use of co-location on towers to curb their spread - and will ask the telecoms regulator to make co-location mandatory where viable.

“The telecom operators are quick to blame the permit agencies like EPA for the poor quality service. Meanwhile they have not been able to take a single action on co-location since they started discussions on it years now,” said Mr Ebenezer K. Appiah-Sampong, Director of Environmental Assessment and Auditor of the EPA.

The country already has five operators, and according to figures from the Mobile World database, the country had 11.3 million customers at the end of last year. That figure equates to a population penetration level of just 48%.

The five operators (and market share) are: MTN (57%), Tigo (25.7%), Ghana Telecom (14.4%), Kasapa Telecom (2.8%) & Westel that was acquired by Zain (2.4%)

China Mobile Denies MTN Takeover Claim

­Reports in the media that China Mobile Communications Corp. (CMCC) is seeking a partner for a takeover of South Africa's MTN Group have been denied by the firm. The reports, which first emerged in the South China Morning Post, citing unnamed sources said that the company was seeking to be a junior partner in a takeover attempt.

The Chinese carrier is “not aware” of the investment plans reported by the newspaper, Rainie Lei, a spokeswoman for Hong Kong-listed China Mobile Ltd. told Bloomberg News.

The original news report had said that China Mobile had approached or plans to approach companies with a strong African and Middle Eastern presence such as France Telecom; Zain, Orascom Telecom and Etisalat.

It is possible that CMCC is looking at a purchase without using its Hong Kong listed subsidiary, and while this would be highly unusual, it would resolve a key reason given for MTN wishing to sell some of its overseas operations. MTN has subsidiaries in Iran, Syria and Sudan - all countries which the US has trade sanctions against and MTN's involvement in those countries could be causing difficulties in securing US investors. While the listed arm, China Mobile Hong Kong would face the same problems with the US government, the state-controlled parent group, China Mobile Communications would usually have no such qualms.

See Story

China Mobile Seeks Partner for MTN Stake

China Mobile is reportedly seeking a junior partner to buy the assets of South African mobile operator MTN in Iran, Syria and Sudan, valued at about USD 2 billion, the South China Morning Post reported, citing unnamed informed sources.

The company has approached or plans to approach companies with a strong African and Middle Eastern presence such as France Telecom, Kuwait's Zain, Orascom of Egypt and Etisalat. The paper's sources said that China Mobile's attempt to buy a minority stake in the MTN units on its own was rebuffed.

China Mobile is looking overseas as its domestic urban markets become saturated and amid forecasts much of the future growth in the sector is destined to come from poorer rural areas. 

Econet Begins Burundi Operations

Mobile operator Econet Wireless has launched its operations in Burundi. The company has for the past year been setting up office, recruiting workers, installing masts and doing preliminary testing. Econet Wireless is now connecting clients for a one-month network testing.

According to East African Business Week, the public has received the new operator with enthusiasm. For quite a while, potential clients were bombarding Econet offices with requests as a result of the sometimes erratic connectivity of the existing service providers. Econet Burundi MD Darlington Mandivenga said during the first 30 days, customers will be connected to test the voice quality and coverage of the network as the technical team fine tunes everything. He said the Econet has "hundreds of thousands" of customers on it waiting list.

Currently, Telecel is the biggest player in the market using the trade name Ucom, with about 295,000 subscribers. The second largest is the state-run Onamob, which has 79,000 subscribers. It is followed by Africell, which recently rebranded to the name Tempo, with 23,000 subscribers.

Yanick Mugisha, the brand manager at Econet told East African Business Week the plan was to have over 100,000 subscribers in the first month. The clincher for Econet may be the SMS interconnection agreement it has signed with the other operators, as to date, mobile users could not send SMS from one mobile operator to the other.

The network testing will cover about 16 provinces where Econet has installed base stations. Econet hopes to cover 94 percent of the country by the time it launches its network in a month's time.

Uganda Telecom & Standard Chartered in Mobile Banking Deal

Customers of Standard Chartered Bank, who subscribe to Uganda Telecom Limited, will now access banking services through their mobile phone handsets.

In this agreement, customers would simply need to register with the bank to have access and thereafter, they would have to press the characters on a mobile phone to get data.

Bank General Manager in charge of Small and Medium Enterprises, Mr Harton Maliki said the bank invested in the new service to enable its customers acquire data quickly and efficiently.

“It is a secure system fordata that is not stored on the Sim card. It is readable and is for downloading by only users,” Mr Maliki said.

The initiative, aimed at increasing access to bank’s services, was announced on Wednesday at the bank’s head offices in Kampala.

“At Standard Chartered, We are continuously developing solutions to respond to the evolving needs of our customers. M-banking - like other recent initiatives from the bank - seeks to enable our customers to do their banking at their convenience anytime, anywhere, any day,” Mr Maliki said.

He said the bank’s M-banking proposition in Uganda provides its customers with a number of services on a unique platform called Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD); a system used by a few banks across the world.

UTL Chief Commercial Officer, Mr Hans Paulsen said the partnership was another way of mobile telephone use penetrating into the world with bank customers now accessing services from their respective places.

Mr Paulsen said the bank service is another way, among the many uses, a mobile phone can be utilised adding that he was optimistic the customers will get the value for their money.
 
“Utl is proud to be part of growth in mobile penetration and this being one of the biggest social phenomena, which will impact and change the way that we trade and pay as well as bringing affordable and convenient access at your fingertips,” Mr Paulsen said.  

Zambian Communications Minister Defends Herself

Zambian Communications and Transport Minister Dora Siliya on Thursday ended her defence before a special tribunal that was set up last month to probe her alleged abuse of office in the capital Lusaka.

Siliya is alleged to have violated the ministerial code of conduct by arbitrarily cancelling a duly awarded tender for the supply of new radars for two airports in the country.

In the second allegation, Siliya is alleged to have awarded a consultancy contract to a firm based in the Cayman Islands without subjecting the award to a competitive tender in accordance with government tender procedure.

In the third allegation Siliya is alleged to have obtained US$2,300 from the Petauke District Council where she is also a Member of Parliament, claiming to have bought water pumps for the local authority when in fact she had not.

The tribunal was set up in accordance with the law, after ten civil society groups and a former minister of communication and transport petitioned to have the tribunal set up.

The petitioners have already brought in several witnesses who have all given testimony against the minister in relation to the three allegations.

Siliya however opted to take the stand herself and denied any wrong doing in the allegations.

She said she attempted to cancel the contract for the supply of the radars after receiving complaints from the public alleging that the radar contract award had been fraught with corruption, but said her attempt was overruled by the Zambia National Tender Board.

She also defended herself on the second allegation by saying that the consultancy contract was approved by the Solicitor General after he made several legal observations.

She denied wrongly claiming the US$2,300 for the water pumps and insisted that she had advanced her personal money to the council and later correctly sought a refund.

The minister had only one witness, an official from Petauke District Council, who defended her of any wrong doing.

The three man tribunal will now pass judgement as to whether Siliya abused her authority. If so, she could lose both her ministerial and parliamentary seats and face prosecution.

Telkom Gets New MD for Its Business Unit

South African fixed-line operator Telkom has appointed Nombulelo Moholi as the new managing director of its Telkom SA business unit. The 49-year-old Moholi will join the firm in early May.

She is an experienced telecoms executive who, after a formative career as an engineer at GEC and Siemens, joined Telkom in 1994. She spent 11 years at Telkom during which she was promoted to several senior positions, including group executive for regulatory affairs, managing executive for the international and wholesale business and finally chief sales and marketing officer and a member of the Telkom Executive Committee.

Moholi left Telkom in 2005 to join the Nedbank Group, where she has served as the chief strategy and corporate affairs officer and a member of the executive committee for just over three years. Telkom comprises three business units: the Telkom SA business unit, Telkom International and Telkom Data Centre Operations.

Moholi will lead the Telkom SA business unit, which comprises wholesale and network operations and the consumer and enterprise divisions. 

Cell C Gets New CEO

South African mobile operator Cell C has named Lars Reichelt as the company's new CEO. Reichelt has served as CEO of Banglalink, Orascom Telecom's venture in Dhaka, and as CEO of Telefonica 3G Mobile in Zurich.

Outgoing CEO Jeffrey Hedberg will remain as chairman of Virgin Mobile South Africa and work closely with the management team during the company's re-positioning. 

Ghana Telecom Staff Prepare for Retirement

­Staff at Ghana Telecom who have taken advantage of the firms recent offer for voluntary redundancy are to benefit from a customized Transition Support Programme which has been developed to help them to manage the change effectively as they seek different jobs after they leave the firm.

Around 850 jobs, out of a total workforce of 4,000 are to be cut in the voluntary program.

Last August, Vodafone completed the acquisition of a 70% stake in state-controlled fixed-line and mobile operator Ghana Telecom for US$900 million on a debt-free, cash-free basis. The Ghanaian parliament approved the sale, despite criticism from the opposition party who believe the shares are undervalued and said that the deal isn't in the national interest.

The programme, which will take the form of counselling and Training is designed to help the staff to obtain a deeper appreciation of the change to enable them make a smooth transition to a new life.

In a statement, Vodafone said that it is concerned that the staff are equipped with basic skills to plan and manage their personal finances better, with particular reference to their disengagement packages. Those desirous of setting up their own businesses will be taken through basic entrepreneurship training, while those seeking regular employment contracts elsewhere will be helped to prepare themselves for a job search to enhance their chances of securing interviews in the organisations they wish to work for.

According to estimates from the Mobile World subscriber tracker, the mobile network ended last year with just over 1.6 million subscribers - equating to a market share of around 27%.