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New Telecoms law for Parliament Thursday

Jan 08, 2013 News

 

New legislation for the telecommunications sector is back on the table for Thursday’s sitting of the National Assembly. It had been deferred last week.
The new law is aimed at breaking the so-called telephone monopoly held by the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company, GT&T.
The Bill is to provide for the establishment of the Telecommunications Agency “and for a regular, coordinated, open and competitive telecommunications sector.”
The legislation was slated for debate last week but was deferred to allow the government to carry out further consultations.
Digicel Guyana, which credits itself with bringing down the cost of handsets and slashing by half, local rates in its six years of operations here, has argued that its ability to generate a better profit is stymied by the telecommunications monopoly.
The company has especially been prevented from offering international services.
Inbound and outbound calls through Digicel’s network are routed through GT&T, since the company is the only one with an international licence in the telecommunications sector.
Digicel has forever complained about its inability to operate the way it wants, and the only gateway is legislation.
The legislation was due for the last Parliament, but was subsequently pulled by the government. Soon after, the two companies engaged in a public debate about who was responsible, with Digicel accusing GT&T of threatening legal action if the law went through. GT&T rubbished the accusation.
Digicel has argued that businesses should thrive on merit and through competing vigorously, “not by sitting on a guaranteed monopoly for two decades that grants it significant advantages over other operators.”
The company had said that the decision by the government to stall the legislation meant that international calling rates remained high.
Recently, the government said that there is no deliberate move to delay the liberalisation of the local telecommunication sector, since such a process is critical to the country’s national development strategy.
The Bill could have gone to Parliament earlier, but the government decided to hold off allowing for further consultations with Digicel and GT&T.
The Bill calls for a number of changes in the policies and operations of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which regulates rates, and as such an Amendment to the PUC Act is also due for passage in the House on Thursday.
The new legal framework created is “characterized by transparency and non-discrimination in the issuance and monitoring of licenses and authorizations to use the spectrum, seamless interconnection and access  between and among telecommunications networks and services and price regulation where required to ensure competition and protect consumers.”

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