The crucial importance that mobile phone companies play in the development of the country cannot be overstated. The even more important roles that these networks play in facilitating business can also not be overstated. Yet the question in all business people’s minds is “are these networks living up to their mandate.”
Blackouts have become perennial. There are days when there is no signal for hours on end. Yet we hardly ever hear the telecommunications regulator come out publicly at least to tell the nation what action is being taken against mobile phone companies.
We had imagined that when the state established Botswana Telecommunications Authority it was not just to ensure fair competition between phone companies but also to ensure that once licensed, these telephone companies would comply with license requirements. It cannot be enough for a mobile phone company to be ever boasting about how many subscribers it has, without going further to also say just what as a network company it has done in investment terms to ensure compliance with the license it holds.
It should be a source of shame that more than ten years since the first mobile phone company was licensed there are still long stretches along the main national road, A1, linking the country’s two biggest cities (Gaborone and Francistown) where none of the three networks is available.
We are not privy to the licensing details, but the fact that so many of users across the networks are always complaining can only be a sign of systemic under-investment by mobile phone companies, or in worse cases, clear acts of non-compliance with licensing regulatory frameworks.
When Botswana Telecommunications Corporation took a commendable step to take advantage of telecommunications liberation by way of starting a mobile arm, we imagined that it would be a thing of the past to find vast areas with many people who could not use mobile phones.
We clearly were wrong.
The BTC mobile phone arm has clearly not taken advantage of the vast network penetration accorded it by state investments over the years.
More to the point, it is still not clear why this mobile company is yet to make a footprint in many parts of the country when  the truth is that it came into the scene with an unfair advantage, so to speak, because it did not have to start everything from scratch.
The situation is not helped by the fact that the other two privately owned mobile phone companies seem content with whatever profits they are making from the investments they have in urban areas.
It would seem like there is no incentive whatsoever on these companies to broaden their network outreach for new business.
That we think is an area for the regulator.
We call on BTA to closely monitor if the extended periods of time when these networks are down do not amount to a breach of license obligations.
It cannot be right that more than ten years since the first license was issued, Batswana are still grappling with the problems that would in normal situations be classified as teething hurdles.
The road linking Francistown and Gaborone is by far the busiest national road; carry so many users including international visitors who arrive in Botswana under a false impression, often a result of false marketing, that the entire road has network accessibility.
