Mascom Wireless is looking to fill three key positions of Chief Executive Officer, Chief Operations Officer and Chief Planning and Control Officer in the near future.
The telecommunications giant has advertised the three key positions with deadline set for 20th of December this year. Keen interest is however on the Chief Executive Officer post which has been held by Jose Couceiro who was hired through a management outsourcing system. Couceiro’s contract is coming to an end in the not so far future.
Given the need to hire a new CEO, it has since emerged that Mascom’s major shareholder, Botswana Public Officers Pension Fund (BPOPF) is not comfortable with the current arrangement where the company’s management is hired on ‘outsourcing’ basis.
Insiders, however say BPOPF appreciate the fact that currently the company has almost 99 percent of its management in the country being locals, whereas only 3, including the outgoing Chief Executive are foreigners. It is believed fund is pushing for the localisation of the post.
PETI has been in providing management services to Mascom for the past 15 years, but the contract, which is has come under scrutiny. Another prominent shareholder in the Mascom Wireless stable is MTN through Econet Wireless, among others.
Mascom board chairman, Allen Keitsing told Sunday Standard in a brief interview that he was not in a position to talk about the issue at hand as.
“I cannot give a comment on something that is still ongoing. Anything can happen as this is a process. I do not want to spark at debate in regard to this issue”, Keitsing said in an interview adding that he cannot even say the date at which they will hire a new CEO for Mascom.
BPOPF Board Chairman declined to comment on the issue saying the people who are better placed to answer questions relating to the hiring of company management is the board itself. Efforts to talk to Mascom board chairman, Allen Keitsing proved futile at the time of going to press. The Mascom Chief Communication Officer, Tebogo Lebotse had referred this publication to Keitsing.
Mascom was licensed on February 17th 1998 as one of the two companies to establish, maintain and operate a GSM Mobile network in Botswana. Over the years, Mascom has steadily deployed its services across Botswana. Small villages and communities around Botswana are now connected to telecommunications.
In June 2012, the company announced the aggressive expansion of 3.5G technology, which upon completion will see close to 80 percent of the country’s population enjoying the super-fast broadband access, with speeds of up to 21 Mbps.
The company executives say that concurrent to the 3.5G deployment, the 2.5G network was also upgraded to increase capacity by over 50 percent. At the same time it has launched the 4G LTE pilot project which positions it among the first in the SADC region to announce the advanced technology.
