Communications: Spectrum ‘policy direction’ promise broken

‘Policy direction’ on licensing unassigned high-demand radio frequency spectrum should have been issued to the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) by close of business on Friday, according to an undertaking made by Communications & Digital Technologies Minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams in her budget vote speech. However, while the document concerned has apparently been ‘finalised’, it must be subjected to certain unspecified ‘processes’ before being published. Somewhat bewilderingly, Icasa announced this on Friday on behalf of ‘the Ministry of Communications & Digital Technologies’ in a four-line media statement promising ‘further information … in due course’. This should probably have come from the Minister or her spokesman, rather than the regulator, notes Pam Saxby for Legalbrief Policy Watch. 

It is now 10 months since President Cyril Ramaphosa announced in his economic stimulus and recovery plan that the ‘process’ for allocating spectrum ‘to enable licensing’ would be ‘initiated’ ‘within the next few weeks’. Although a draft policy direction quickly followed, there has been no word from the Minister herself on the matter beyond vague undertakings invariably involving the word ‘soon’. On 20 June, in his State of the Nation Address, the President reassured stakeholders that Icasa would receive direction ‘within the next month’ – which was generally understood to mean 30 days (Tech Central) and tallies with Ndabeni-Abrahams’ reference on 11 July to ‘seven working days’. Time’s up, and stakeholders deserve an explanation.

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