Related Articles
Top Stories
May 23 2012 18:03
Facebook and banks are being sued by Facebook's shareholders, who claimed the defendants hid Facebook's weakened growth forecasts ahead of its initial public offering.
May 23 2012 15:59
Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan has made an unusual appeal to the Constitutional Court in a bid to set aside the high court order halting e-tolling.
May 23 2012 22:00
Economic liberation or the lack thereof is the most divisive issue in the country, according to a survey.
Cape Town - Parliament's portfolio committee on
communications on Wednesday questioned the role of the Independent
Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) and its ability as a regulator.
In a number of questions posed to the Competition Commission, one member
of the committee asked: "Do you think Icasa has the capacity and expertise
(in its capacity as a regulator)?"
"Icasa has not delivered as quickly as it ought to. Don't strip Icasa of
its role, but encourage it to make that constitution work properly, as it
should," a spokesperson for the commission retorted.
Questions have been raised about Icasa dragging its heels over requests
to reduce interconnection rates.
The committee accused the Competition Commission of being one-sided,
taking the role of defending operators, and not taking into account the fact
that many South Africans were extremely poor and could not afford the high
tariffs.
The committee has proposed to reduce the interconnection rate from 1.25
rand to 60 cents with effect from November 1 and by a further 15 cents every
November until 2012.
"My fear is that the figure is not too low, but that it is too high,"
said a spokesperson for the commission. He stressed that the figure would
then not come down any further because the incorrect figure had been arrived
at in the first place.
- I-Net Bridge