Browsing: Quraysh Patel

The resignation of Sentech chairman Quraysh Patel after just seven months in the job has left many concerned about the state-owned company’s future. His work at the troubled broadcasting signal

Quraysh Patel has resigned as chairman of the state-owned broadcasting signal distributor Sentech. Patel handed his resignation to communications minister Roy Padayachie on Tuesday.

Questions have been raised about the SA telecommunications and IT regulator’s complicity in allowing Global Web Intact (GWI) and Screamer to lease spectrum, apparently illegally, from Sentech. This follows the leaking of internal Sentech

Communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda says a task team appointed by him in July 2009 had identified “anomalies” and an “illegal operational model” at state-owned Sentech. Though he doesn’t state it explicity, Nyanda is clearly referring to Sentech’s controversial 2007 spectrum deal with Global Web Intact (GWI).

Altech UEC, a Durban-based manufacturer of digital decoders and set-top boxes, has filed papers in the Pietermaritzburg high court against state-owned broadcast signal distributor Sentech. Sentech has been given until next Thursday

The cash-strapped state-owned signal distributor, Sentech, appears to have cut an illegal deal to sell wireless broadband spectrum that benefited politically connected businessmen, led by Eddie Funde, the controversial former chairman of the SABC who is now South Africa’s ambassador to Germany.

Screamer Telecoms was still using Sentech’s radio frequency spectrum as recently as October 2009, internal Sentech documents leaked to TechCentral have revealed. This is despite the state-owned company cancelling the agreement with Screamer

A former senior Telkom executive, Setumo Mohapi, will be appointed as the new CEO of broadcasting signal distributor Sentech later this month. TechCentral has learnt from a reliable political source that

Sentech unlawfully allowed Screamer, a wireless Internet access provider, to use the state-owned company’s spectrum to provide services, its chairman, Quraysh Patel, has alleged. And Patel has asked the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa)