EDITORIAL: Icasa, your phone is off
Behind cellphone company Cell C’s travails is something of greater concern: grotesque regulatory incompetence
It is one of the worst-kept secrets in the telecoms industry that cellphone company Cell C has been struggling with its debt load and, on Tuesday, ratings agency S&P Global Ratings confirmed the extent of the problem by downgrading the company’s debt from CC to a D rating. A CC rating is pretty bad; it suggests default is imminent, with little prospect of recovery. D is, well, worse. For the company and its debt holders, this is obviously bad news. But behind the company’s travails is something of greater concern: grotesque regulatory incompetence. The Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) has done good work in the past and recently has been active in trying to get the state broadcaster to report the truth. But on the licensing side, Icasa has been a nightmare for the industry. Its competence is low, its decision-making has been slow, it is bureaucratic and indecisive – all the things we have gradually become inured to as citizens of SA. This is an organisation that cos...
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