The Competition Commission on Wednesday called for the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) to play a greater regulatory role in determining cellphone interconnection rates.

Icasa should also ensure these rates were set on a defensible basis, commissioner Shan Ramburuth told the national assembly’s communications committee.

The committee is holding public hearings on what it says is the excessive and exorbitant costs of mobile interconnection rates in the industry. These are the fees one network charges another for terminating or completing calls on its network.

“We shouldn’t be guessing these figures. You must also be able to justify how you arrived at a particular figure,” Ramburuth said.

Any figure arrived at arbitrarily might be subject to challenge. Icasa had costing information available, in its code of account/cost allocation manual (COA/CAM) study, which would allow it to arrive at a defensible interim figure.

This should allow for a substantial but reasonable once-off reduction on the basis of the costing methodology applied in the COA/CAM.

The commission also supported further reductions over the next three years, but this should also be done on a defensible basis, he said.

A question that had arisen for Icasa, in determining an interim rate, was whether such rates should be bilaterally or multilaterally negotiated by the incumbents.

If the price setting process was led and enforced by Icasa, competition law concerns arising from either bilateral or multilateral discussions would fall away.

However, competition problems might arise in cases where private firms engaged in multilateral discussions independent of the regulatory process.

Therefore, the commission favoured a greater regulatory role for Icasa in determining call termination rates, and that Icasa ensure that these rates were set on a defensible basis, Ramburuth said. — Sapa

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