US firm to build East Africa’s $300m underwater cable
Jonah Iboma
In Grahamstown , South Africa
Herakles Telecom, a United States of America -based Telecommunications Company is to build an East African Submarine cable, an official of the Africa Progressive Communications has said.
Coura Fall, Information Communication Technology Policy Advocacy Officer, APC, said the cable to be known as SEACOM will operate a 13,000 submarine fibre optic cable along the east coast of Africa and through the Red Sea.
He said “Herakles Telecom is to build the SEACOM marine cable along the East Coast of Africa whose work is to be completed by the year 2009 at a cost of $300m.”
At a presentation at the ongoing Highway Africa Conference on South Africa, Herakles said, the cable, would compete with two other cables currently under construction- the Kenyan government-sponsored The East Africa Marine System (TEAMS) and the East African Submarine System (EASSy).
When completed, it will connect major urban centres of Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Tanzania and South Africa and the United Arab Emirates before it terminates in Italy. Uganda being a landlocked country in the region could benefit from the project if it connects her national fibre optic cable through any of the countries.
She said that the East African Submarine Cable and the South Atlantic-3 (SAT-3)
projects have delayed due to a number of challenges.
She said, “The challenge for the EASSy and SAT3 are rather different, on the EASSy there are processes in place where issues are discussed but these are not completely transparent.”
Fall, who made a presentation “Access to ICT’s in Africa, said there was inadequate debate on these projects and as such had limited their delivery to the people.
She said, “On the SAT3, the decision making process is completely in closed doors, therefore the advocacy coalition needs to find ways that will make them need to react publicly and to force a discussion within the consortium that brings out the differences.
“Governments need to provide regulators and policy makers with means to address the issues, to create public debates and to challenge the lack of transparency and the current pricing and to negotiate for lower prices.”
She said the future of the projects was shaky following the disagreements over prices to be charged from the users of the cable.
“The war between the civil society organisation and regulators for both projects is on the prices for accessing the cable lack of transparency in the processes that are going on,” she said.
In Grahamstown , South Africa
Herakles Telecom, a United States of America -based Telecommunications Company is to build an East African Submarine cable, an official of the Africa Progressive Communications has said.
Coura Fall, Information Communication Technology Policy Advocacy Officer, APC, said the cable to be known as SEACOM will operate a 13,000 submarine fibre optic cable along the east coast of Africa and through the Red Sea.
He said “Herakles Telecom is to build the SEACOM marine cable along the East Coast of Africa whose work is to be completed by the year 2009 at a cost of $300m.”
At a presentation at the ongoing Highway Africa Conference on South Africa, Herakles said, the cable, would compete with two other cables currently under construction- the Kenyan government-sponsored The East Africa Marine System (TEAMS) and the East African Submarine System (EASSy).
When completed, it will connect major urban centres of Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Tanzania and South Africa and the United Arab Emirates before it terminates in Italy. Uganda being a landlocked country in the region could benefit from the project if it connects her national fibre optic cable through any of the countries.
She said that the East African Submarine Cable and the South Atlantic-3 (SAT-3)
projects have delayed due to a number of challenges.
She said, “The challenge for the EASSy and SAT3 are rather different, on the EASSy there are processes in place where issues are discussed but these are not completely transparent.”
Fall, who made a presentation “Access to ICT’s in Africa, said there was inadequate debate on these projects and as such had limited their delivery to the people.
She said, “On the SAT3, the decision making process is completely in closed doors, therefore the advocacy coalition needs to find ways that will make them need to react publicly and to force a discussion within the consortium that brings out the differences.
“Governments need to provide regulators and policy makers with means to address the issues, to create public debates and to challenge the lack of transparency and the current pricing and to negotiate for lower prices.”
She said the future of the projects was shaky following the disagreements over prices to be charged from the users of the cable.
“The war between the civil society organisation and regulators for both projects is on the prices for accessing the cable lack of transparency in the processes that are going on,” she said.
Comments