The government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) has asked telecoms operators to suspend work until new regulations for the sector are released, according to Telegeography quoting Zain Sudan’s COO Hisham Mustafa Allam.
Southern Sudan is expected to become an…
The government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) has asked telecoms operators to suspend work until new regulations for the sector are released, according to Telegeography quoting Zain Sudan’s COO Hisham Mustafa Allam.
Southern Sudan is expected to become an independent state in July 2011, having voted for secession at a referendum held last January.
Although Allam reportedly expects Zain’s mobile licence to be valid after July, he fears delays to work on base stations and the fibre-optics roll-out.
He reportedly said that the deployment of broadband network was particularly expensive in Southern Sudan because the landlocked country had to rely on north Sudan or Kenya to access submarine cables.
Zain reportedly invested US$300m over the past five year in the region, representing 20% of its capex in Sudan.
Zain is the largest mobile operator by subscriber number in Sudan.
