A plan by the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) to auction off valuable lots of radio frequency spectrum early next year is on ice after Telecommunications Minister Siyabonga Cwele succeeded in getting the process interdicted on Friday.
The auction would allocate most of the prime spectrum that will become available as a result of the long-delayed migration to digital broadcasting – and the subsequent end of analogue signals.
Icasa had invited bids to the auction in July, with a starting reserve price of R3 billion for each of the four lots on offer.
Cwele viewed this as a usurping of his department’s prerogative to decide how the valuable resource is assigned among operators, while Icasa has repeatedly asserted its “exclusive” entitlement to do the same thing.
The interdict granted on Friday by the Pretoria High Court will freeze the preparations for the auction. Icasa recently pushed the deadline for bids to March next year.
Mobile operator Cell C got a parallel interdict against the auction.
It claims that the auction will result in its better resourced competitors getting the best spectrum, thereby entrenching their dominance in the local industry.