PNG: Renewed calls for full competition in telecommunications
Updated
In Papua New Guinea, there are more calls for the government to abandon its plan to give the government owned phone company, Telikom, a monoploy over telecommunications hardware. The plan would involve the nationalisation of tens of millions of dollars worth of equipment installed by the Irish mobile phone company Digicel. It would also include equipment installed by private internet providers. The renewed calls for an end to the plan come after the Minister for Communications, Patrick Tammur, failed to turn up to a major seminar on the issue last week. The governments plan would see Telikom win sole rights to provide networks while other companies would be restricted to on-selling internet and phone services. Business is angry that the government has failed to consult those involved. The President of the PNG Business Council, Henry Kila says business organisations are united in their oppostion to the government's plan.
Presenter: Jemima Garrett
Speakers: Henry Kila, President PNG Business Council
KILA: We are supposed to be developing an ICT policy that takes us into the future. Now the NetCo-ServCo concept which no other country uses, why should Papua New Guinea, Papua New Guinea's hardly the trail blazer in terms of communications or any other thing for that matter. That system does not work anyway; in fact it's not practiced anywhere, so why should Papua New Guinea invent it?
GARRETT: Some commentators are saying it's going to cost business people in Papua New Guinea from the grassroots level right up substantial amounts of money, is that correct?
KILA: Well in any monopoly, and this will be a monopoly while it's trying to, well it proposes is that NetCo will be owned by Telikom and the service companies will be companies which Telikom will have, be more powerful be in there, GreenCom presumably and Digicel. Now what we're doing is we're just going back to the bad old days of the monopoly, so we all go through this one system, which really is an ageing system.
GARRETT: Now the Papua New Guinea government has a national working group on removing impediments to business. You say it's a disgrace that the committee hasn't met for two years. Why hasn't that committee met?
KILA: Well I guess a lot of it has to be the will on both sides, certainly there's no lack of will from the business sector, but certainly if the committee that's chaired by the Chief Secretary, the incumbent Chief Secretary has chosen not to have any meetings despite many, many calls from the business community from many forums, including this one here that we've just had recently. Unfortunately they are not paying any attention to this.
GARRETT: What would you like to see the government do to change its information and communications policy so that it does include competition?
KILA: Well certainly the first thing they can do is engage more in terms of listening to all stakeholders, and there are many in this very important industry in PNG. They're not doing that and the fact that they didn't turn up at that meeting, the workshop last Wednesday is really just proof of this. They say one thing and do something else. But I think the first thing I would ask them to do is actually sit down and come to the table and listen to many people who are affected by this policy that is going to come up.
GARRETT: You do have a fairly new communications minister in Patrick Tammur; do you have some hope from that?
KILA: Of course, I mean there's always got to be hope; we've always got to be pretty optimistic about these things. Unfortunately we've not had an opportunity to meet with the new minister and certainly last Wednesday was a perfect opportunity for that. But he chose to go somewhere else.
