TechCentralTechCentral
    Facebook Twitter YouTube LinkedIn
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube
    TechCentral TechCentral
    NEWSLETTER
    • News

      Eskom warns recovery from strike chaos could take weeks

      29 June 2022

      Eskom offers workers 7% increase: sources

      29 June 2022

      E-commerce is killing shopping malls – but, curiously, not in South Africa

      29 June 2022

      E.tv: ‘We know we must vacate broadband spectrum bands’

      29 June 2022

      Eskom employees returning to work

      29 June 2022
    • World

      Napster plots crypto comeback

      29 June 2022

      Pictures: Chinese spacecraft acquires images of entire planet of Mars

      29 June 2022

      Arm aims for leg-up in smartphone games with new chip tech

      29 June 2022

      Warnings of a final bitcoin ‘washout’

      29 June 2022

      Sony launches into PC gaming hardware

      29 June 2022
    • In-depth

      The great crypto crash: the fallout, and what happens next

      22 June 2022

      Goodbye, Internet Explorer – you really won’t be missed

      19 June 2022

      Oracle’s database dominance threatened by rise of cloud-first rivals

      13 June 2022

      Everything Apple announced at WWDC – in less than 500 words

      7 June 2022

      Sheryl Sandberg’s ad empire leaves a complicated legacy

      2 June 2022
    • Podcasts

      How your organisation can triage its information security risk

      22 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E06 – ‘Apple Silicon’

      15 June 2022

      The youth might just save us

      15 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E05 – ‘Nvidia: The Green Goblin’

      8 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E04 – ‘The story of Intel – part 2’

      1 June 2022
    • Opinion

      Has South Africa’s advertising industry lost its way?

      21 June 2022

      Rob Lith: What Icasa’s spectrum auction means for SA companies

      13 June 2022

      A proposed solution to crypto’s stablecoin problem

      19 May 2022

      From spectrum to roads, why fixing SA’s problems is an uphill battle

      19 April 2022

      How AI is being deployed in the fight against cybercriminals

      8 April 2022
    • Company Hubs
      • 1-grid
      • Altron Document Solutions
      • Amplitude
      • Atvance Intellect
      • Axiz
      • BOATech
      • CallMiner
      • Digital Generation
      • E4
      • ESET
      • Euphoria Telecom
      • IBM
      • Kyocera Document Solutions
      • Microsoft
      • Nutanix
      • One Trust
      • Pinnacle
      • Skybox Security
      • SkyWire
      • Tarsus on Demand
      • Videri Digital
      • Zendesk
    • Sections
      • Banking
      • Broadcasting and Media
      • Cloud computing
      • Consumer electronics
      • Cryptocurrencies
      • Education and skills
      • Energy
      • Fintech
      • Information security
      • Internet and connectivity
      • Internet of Things
      • Investment
      • IT services
      • Motoring and transport
      • Public sector
      • Science
      • Social media
      • Talent and leadership
      • Telecoms
    • Advertise
    TechCentralTechCentral
    Home»News»SA Connect funding ‘grossly inadequate’

    SA Connect funding ‘grossly inadequate’

    News By Staff Reporter24 February 2016
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email
    Marian Shinn
    Marian Shinn

    Democratic Alliance MP Marian Shinn, who is also the party’s spokeswoman on telecommunications & postal services, has labelled the budget allocated to South Africa’s broadband roll-out plan, dubbed SA Connect, as “grossly inadequate”.

    “R1,6 billion over the [medium-term expenditure framework] (MTEF) period (2016 to 2019) is little over R500m/year,” Shinn said.

    “While the entire allocation is an extra R500m over last year’s original allocation, it is inadequate to the task to meet the objectives set out for the period of 5 803 government sites in eight municipalities by March 2019.”

    Shinn said that although the department of telecoms & and postal services asked for R1,4bn for SA Connect in the MTEF from 2015 to2018, it was only allocated R739m by national treasury. I assume the first R200m that was earmarked for fiscal 2015/2016 has been unspent and rolled over into this new MTEF.”

    Details of how this money is to be spent is unclear, she said. “The telecoms department has refused my requests via parliamentary questions to reveal these and said it will not release the work plan as this is a dynamic document and subject to frequent change in a rapidly changing ICT environment.

    “But the provision of high-speed broadband connectivity to the identified eight municipalities will require substantial upgrades to the telecoms infrastructure in those areas,” she added.

    Shinn said it is also “puzzling” that one of government’s infrastructure support programme objectives is the establishment of a wholesale open-access network by March 2018.

    “According to SA Connect this network, envisioned as a private-public partnership, is key to delivering high-speed broadband to underserviced areas. Yet phases 1 and 2 of SA Connect are to be delivered before the network plan is completed, let alone operational. This indicates that whichever network wholesale company gets the business to install/upgrade the networks for phase 1 and 2 will gain a significant head-start and share of forming this partnership network,” she said.

    “This would seem to be at odds with the finance minister’s undertaking that infrastructure roll-outs would be based on public-private partnerships. He spoke about ‘many opportunities for joint public and private investment and facilities management’ in energy, transport and telecoms.

    “He also said ‘the strength of our state-owned companies does not lie in protecting their dominant monopoly positions, but in their capacity to partner’ with business investors.

    “[The telecoms department] sees Telkom as a state-owned company, rather than a JSE-listed company, so joining the dots of the budget speech one gets the impression that government, by delaying the formation of the national broadband network, is likely to help Telkom use SA Connect to upgrade its rural network to give it an advantage over competitors in the formation and market reach of the network.” — © 2016 NewsCentral Media

    Marian Shinn Telkom
    Share. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email
    Previous ArticleGov’t tender portal to fight corruption
    Next Article Backspace: ‘Happy birthday, Steve’

    Related Posts

    Eskom warns recovery from strike chaos could take weeks

    29 June 2022

    Eskom offers workers 7% increase: sources

    29 June 2022

    E-commerce is killing shopping malls – but, curiously, not in South Africa

    29 June 2022
    Add A Comment

    Comments are closed.

    Promoted

    Think herding cats is tricky? Try herding a cloud

    29 June 2022

    How your business can help hybrid workers effectively

    28 June 2022

    Hands off our satellite spectrum!

    27 June 2022
    Opinion

    Has South Africa’s advertising industry lost its way?

    21 June 2022

    Rob Lith: What Icasa’s spectrum auction means for SA companies

    13 June 2022

    A proposed solution to crypto’s stablecoin problem

    19 May 2022

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    © 2009 - 2022 NewsCentral Media

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.