Independent Communications Authority of South Africa

So if you've been following the Starlink debate in South Africa, you'd be forgiven for having no idea where things actually stand.

Starlink blames our ownership laws, government says that the company is welcome, and the ICASA says the law still ties its hands.

Meanwhile, Starlink has expanded to more than 25 other African countries.

So let's just take a moment.

It's even offered broadband to over 5,000 rural schools as a starting point, which was reportedly valued at half a billion rand.

So here's where things get messy, and let me not trip over my own feet here.

Government wants ICASA, our communications regulator, to accept these programs as an alternative to the 30% ownership.

Now, the problem here is that the law that ICASA has to follow as our communications regulator still requires this 30%.

When you were writing in 2022, the minister was from the ANC.

Look, I think more than anything for us, how we're looking at it, because we've been talking both to the policymaker, which is different ministers, and ICASA, because ICASA, as you can tell, they've received the policy directive in 2019.

They've tried everything they could.

They know that it cannot work.

And spectrum that remains idle, it means no investment.

It means no connectivity.

So for us, we are more inclined to say ICASA because ICASA does play that role effectively to advise the minister when the policy directive does not make sense.

I don't expect you at all to suggest how much an auction could raise, but do you expect network operators to be very interested in this spectrum? You talk about high demand.

I think in terms of network coverage, network coverage is basically where the signal reaches you, right? Whereas inclusion, inclusion is basically whether you can use that data affordably, consistently in an appropriate way to make your life better, right? So in a more useful way.

And I think if you look at the stats ICASA has put out, about 99.5% of South Africa is penetrated with 4G coverage.

In terms of stats SA household, household penetration on internet access anywhere is upstanding at about 80%.

Now let's take that home, back to the home, where we see that internet in the form of fibre, fixed wireless access is sitting at about 17% penetration on the household.

In reviewing what that business case is, is understanding who the offtaker is, where the demand is coming from, and does it actually have a business case or a social case? And that is then what we then fund against, which is then the cash flows that come out of the infrastructure that is being built.

And of course, Louise, overarching all of this is regulation, right? So do you think new deployment rules can meaningfully speed up fiber rollout? And where do you think the biggest regulatory bottleneck is right now?

Yes, I think that's very topical at the moment because ICASA has recently released, you know, draft regulations on rapid deployment.

And, you know, I attended some of the hearings, the public hearings that ICASA hosted.

Let me pull all of this together.

The chairperson of ICASA, the Independent Communications Authority, is Motibi Ramusi.

Motibi, welcome to you.

So what specific market failure then is this inquiry trying to fix?

Now, noting that, you know, the sector that we regulate in the past 10 years, it has changed.

We've seen multiple other sectors crossing over into what one would have traditionally said is just a mobile n- inf- environment.

So as an authority, we saw it fit that given the fact that there's been these changes within the sector, we need then to understand the new behavior from a cost point of view and even from me and you being subscribers in terms of the impact that might have, because given now that you've got companies that have actually built infrastructure, as you said in- initially in terms of the fair pay, the issue around fair share relates around somebody having built a network and then availing a network to a third party, and the big question that has always been asked is, are there no n- is there no need for somebody who's going to use my infrastructure to actually then pay me? Because I am providing services based on what a regulator like ICASA would have provided, whether in this instance it could have been Spectrum, and because my network is designed to provide services based on certain speeds, traffic management.

So as an OTT, obviously because you are now dealing with high data capacity, so in terms of consumption, one is eligible to say that p- There's a need then to manage my en- my environment.

SABC News, independent and impartial.

ICASA, the Independent Communication Authority of South Africa, has launched a market inquiry into over-the-top services and their impact on telecommunications and broadcast licensees.

The regulator will assess whether platforms offering voice, messaging and video streaming should fall under local licensing rules.

To unpack what this inquiry could mean for the industry and consumers, We joined on the line by Haimaira Hayat, the Senior Associate at Weber Wenzel.

Hi Alton.

Let's start with the basics.

What exactly is ICASA investigating with this inquiry and why has the regulator decided to look at over-the-top services now? I

think we've been expecting this inquiry for some time.

So the likes of MTN and Vodacom are looking to get streaming platforms such as Netflix and YouTube to help maintain network infrastructure in the country.

So what they're basically putting forward to ICASA is that, uh, such companies, the likes of YouTube and Netflix, are using already existing infrastructure in South Africa that they've built, and they're not paying, uh, what they have to pay as local telecoms companies.

So to be fair, they've asked ICASA, that is MTN and Vodacom, to help, for these US companies to help maintain network infrastructure.

But it's one of the best rounds I've heard here on The Money Show in terms of Friday Biz Blitz.

Victoria out of Centurion, keeping a keen eye on the show and also keeping a, quite a clear ear to some of the topics we covered this week.

It's been going on for years.

What makes this ICASA inquiry different from, uh, previous potential interventions?

That's a very good question.

Um, there have been many investigations and regulatory probes over the years into the telecommunications sector in South Africa on pricing specifically, and not only by ICASA, but also by the competition authorities, and, uh, we even had, uh, Solomon Mdalahti, the, uh, communications minister, uh, uh, speaking the other day and, and saying we, we need to investigate why prices are so high.

It could, could of course something have-- have something to do with the fact that there's, there's, there's an election a couple of months away.

But, um, there are, um, there, there's no doubt that, um, there was a, a big expectation that, uh, the data and, and voice prices, particularly data prices, would come down after the spectrum auction, which I think was concluded in twenty twenty-two.

That was the ICASA auction-

Mm

So let's take whether it's Huawei, whether it's Samsung, whether it's Apple.

You'll see that on the box of the device, they'll have a sticker on the way it says it's ICASA approved.

So these phones that come into South Africa for, well, officially, they have to get approved by ICASA.

ICASA needs to do the testing.

But phones that come in counterfeit will not have the ICASA approval, and that will obviously make it quite difficult, and they're actually counterfeit as well.

So help us understand, or just help us unpack just a little bit more, Faisal, because there have also been several seizures of suspected counterfeit Apple products in South Africa, including previous operations in Forsberg.

But what have authorities sort of established then through these cases about the counterfeit electronics trade?