TELECOMMUNICATIONS
Nationalising radio spectrum fails to heed a past lesson
By nationalising radio spectrum, SA risks a repetition of the fixed-line monopoly fallacy, writes Ivo Vegter
The #DataMustFall movement seeks lower mobile and fixed-line data prices. Don’t we all? Not obvious is whether its premise is valid, and, even if it were, history proves that government regulation would not achieve it. When telecommunications policy was first proposed during the transition to a new democracy, the government was determined to maintain control of what it saw as a strategic sector. The only gesture towards market liberalisation was to issue licences for cellphones to private operators. The belief was that cellphones were toys for the rich and the profit motive would result in limited market penetration of perhaps 1-million people. Shows you what central planners know. Fixed-line telephony was considered the infrastructure backbone upon which to build access for the poor and previously disadvantaged. It was reserved for Telkom, which enjoyed a state-guaranteed monopoly from 1997 until 2002. The nominal quid pro quo was that Telkom had to install 1-million lines into und...
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