accueil > domaines > services > par secteur > services de télécommunications > réunion extraordinaire > conseil du commerce des services

25 juin 1999
Réunion extraordinnaire sur les services de télécommunication

Mr David Hatridge, Director WTO Trade In Services, Mr Robert Blois, Moderator and Deputy Secretary General, ITU, Distinguished Delegates, Fellow Seminar Participants, Ladies and Gentlemen

Introduction haut de page

It is indeed a great honour to me for having been invited by the Director for the WTO Trade In Services, Mr. Hatridge to be one of the panellists in a seminar topic entitled “The Challenges of Establishing Independent Regulatory Bodies and Developing Transparent Regulatory Procedures”. This is also a useful initiation to my new responsibilities in the telecommunications regulatory assignment which has just been given to me by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) on being appointed one of the Vice Chairpersons of the Telecommunications Development Advisory Group (T-DAG) responsible for regulatory issues in the African Region.

Let me briefly map out a background to my country - Botswana. It is a landlocked country bounded by South Africa, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe with a total land mass of about 582 000 square kilometres or of the same size as France in Europe or Kenya in Africa or Texas in the United States. The population is about 1.5 million and therefore one of the least densely populated countries in the world. Whilst most of the population is concentrated along the eastern corridor, there are nevertheless scattered rural communities throughout a country, 80 per cent of which is covered by sandy lands of the Kalahari semi desert. Given the large size of the country with an unevenly distributed population, the provision of telecommunications infrastructure is most problematic and hence a headache to both Government, the operators and to say the least, the regulatory body.

Liberalisation haut de page

Botswana Telecommunications Authority (BTA) which is the new Telecommunications regulatory body in Botswana is just 2½ years old having been set up on 20 December 1996 when the Board of 5 persons was appointed (Three women and two men). However its regulatory experience spans a period of just about two years only as the licensing functions were fully commenced on 1 July 1997. Therefore, BTA is still in its infancy and as such in a learning curve with peaks and troughs in sight, and perhaps more troughs than peaks.

Botswana, has since her independence in 1966, encouraged the private sector to provide goods and services and this has led to her becoming one of the first countries in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) region to liberalise the telecommunications industry. This is an entrenched policy across the board in Botswana that government should rid itself of services which can best be provided by the private sector. In the telecommunications industry this step was initiated in 1994 culminating in the adoption of a Telecommunications Policy in December, 1995 after country wide consultations.

The main objective of this policy was to lay down a framework for the liberalisation of the industry through the creation of an investor friendly environment that would ensure a process of fair and healthy competition by

- the promotion of competition and the diversification of technological products and services through the active participation of the private sector; separation of regulatory, operational, and policy functions through the establishment of an independent regulatory body;

- the regulation of the telecommunications industry inorder to enhance attainment of the national goals of universal service, efficient services and a country wide balance; and the participation of consumers.

This policy gave birth to the Telecommunications Act which was passed by Parliament in August 1996 leading to the establishment of BTA in December 1996 with the following functions

- Licensing of telecommunications and broadcasting operators;

- Dispute settlement amongst stakeholders with decisions of BTA challengeable in the High Court only;

- Tariffs approval;

- Promotion and monitoring of free and fair competition;

- Allocation and management of the radio frequency spectrum;

- Type approval of terminal equipment; and

- Protection of consumers.

Achievements haut de page

The main concrete achievements so far realised have been the licensing of two GSM cellular operators in February 1998 involving joint ventures between citizen owned companies and foreign investors like France Telecom, Portugal Telecom and TSM Holdings (Zimbabwe). A first ever private radio broadcasting licence was issued during the World Telecommunications Day activities on the 17 May 1999. This licence is also a joint venture between citizen owned companies holding 51% and 49% for a South African based consortium under Union Alliance as a holding company. A second private radio broadcasting licence will be issued in a not too distant future. In addition, BTA is currently in the process of licensing operators to provide value added telecommunications services on a competitive basis. A large number of radio licences have also been issued as well as type approval certificates.

The mere threat of liberalisation has led the incumbent fixed network operator, Botswana Telecommunications Corporation (BTC), to expand its network at an increasing pace and to start offering new range of services. The teledensity has doubled since 1995 from 3.3 percent to over 6.5 percent at present and BTC expects to double it by 2001. BTC's network is 100 per cent digitalised.

Challenges haut de page

Our experience so far has revealed the following points which need to be taken on board by those regulatory bodies which are still in the making

- The expectations on the new regulator to rapidly transform a well established monopolistic industry are often unrealistic. New potential entrants into the market as well as consumers cannot understand why things are not happening immediately when a new Act or Policy has already been introduced;

- The new regulator often has to deal with delicate and complicated issues such as interconnection disputes, tariff matters and competition issues soon after its establishment inorder to keep pace with high and over simplistic expectations of the various stakeholders;

- Even regulators with a lot of independence and a strong mandate need to earn their credibility and it becomes important to get the first major decisions right in spite of limited experience and often with human and financial constraints. This often results in long processes to see that things are done well in the confidence building exercise but may be interpreted as delays by stakeholders;

- In the developing world there is a lack of experienced professionals in many disciplines and the human resources needed to efficiently regulate the telecommunications industry are virtually non-existent;

- Complex regulatory matters need to be addressed simultaneously with the daunting task of starting an organisation from scratch;

- Telecommunications experts in the specialised telecommunications regulatory field can be useful but they are hard to come by and extremely expensive;

- For the new regulator to make maximum use of the expensive consultants, it also needs capacity to assimilate and receive the advice provided so that there is transfer of technology in the process being value for money spent on fees;

- Lack of accumulated information about the industry which had hitherto been controlled by the incumbent operator that is also hostile to the competitive environment is a serious impediment to both the regulator and the new operators. The new regulator is therefore unable to determine with degree of certainty whether the incumbent operator uses its dominant position in dealing with other operators.

Hints haut de page

The following hints to Governments who will be starting the new regulatory bodies could be useful -

- The newly established regulatory authority needs to be given time to build a functioning organisation before it is expected to address complex and often controversial regulatory matters;

- Selective recruitment of highly trainable staff is desirable and training of staff must be given high priority in order for the regulator to eventually be able to intervene in the market with some degree of credibility and confidence;

- Transparency in decision making is a must if the regulator is to be taken seriously;

- The new regulator should be given legal power to demand information from operators especially the incumbent one;

- The regulator needs to establish its own sources of information as the incumbent operator (in many cases the only source) is often reluctant to provide accurate and useful information in a timely fashion;

- In the rapidly changing telecommunications industry the regulator needs to keep abreast with the latest developments and needs resources to do so. New regulators need a more open interaction with the long established regulators which is not the case now;

- A strong and clear legal mandate with a lot of political and financial latitude will go a long way to fend off potential interference in regulatory matters from other stakeholders in the industry including the government. Experience has shown that the "autonomy" or "independence" of the regulator is a cardinal consideration for the investors who look forward to commercial decisions in the market place from a regulator rather than politically motivated decisions;

- Since "no man is an island", there is a need to learn from other regulators and co-ordinate closely with those in your immediate vicinity. Fortunately, regulators in the SADC region have now formed a Telecommunications Regulators Association of Southern Africa (TRASA) for this purpose. It is my wish that a continental association can be formed in Africa.

Conclusion haut de page

Against the above background, BTA has operated in a supportive environment by Government underwriting the autonomy enshrined in the legislation establishing it. My Minister has repeatedly reiterated this assurance in public fora and the latest pronouncement was at the AFCOM '99 Eighth All Africa Telecommunications, Information Technology and Broadcasting Conference in Virginia, USA when he again said "I would like to assure you that Botswana Telecommunications Authority is politically and financially independent and that its decisions are challeangable only in the High Court".

BTA has also had generous start up support from the Government of Sweden by providing many inputs including advisory personnel since its establishment. The Government of the United States of America has been of great assistance as well through the SATCC/USAID Regional Programme for The Restructuring of Telecommunications in the SADC region. We are indeed grateful for this assistance from these two co-operating partners. A lot of encouragement and support has also been forthcoming from both ITU and WTO and we look forward to their continued guidance.