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No. 37261
GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 24 JANUARY 2014
entrants, and consequently for the regulation of competition, interconnection and facility
leasing arrangements.
5.2.3 Licensing
The Independent Communications Authority (ICASA) may grant electronic communications
network licences and electronic communications services licences. The licences may be
granted on an individual or class basis.
Individual licences can be granted for networks, as well as services at provincial and national
level to licensees operating for commercial purposes. Individual licences are also issued for
networks and services for entities in which a public entity owns interest greater than 25% of
the share capital. The Independent Communications Authority may only grant individual
licences in accordance with a directive issued in terms of Ministerial directives.
Class licences are issued upon registration for networks and services of a district
municipality or those of municipal scope operated for commercial purpose.
This licensing regime came into effect after the enactment of the Electronic Communications
Act of 2005 which mandated all licensees to convert their old licences to fit into the
horizontal licensing order that was contained in the legislation.
5.2.4 Competition issues
2005 is regarded as the watershed year for the intensification of competition brought about
by the Electronic Communications Act (ECA). The Electronic Communications Act intended
to promote competition within the ICT sector.
The current phase of telecom reforms can be described as one where broadband services
are intensified. This is aimed at achieving the National Development Plan's vision. The
success of the Broadband Policy and the meeting of its targets will be dependent, amongst
other things, on the performance of the electronic communications market. Provisions for
competition and the actual competition will be vital in the affordability and the extent of use of
broadband services.
In the electronic communications sector, the debates about the modes of competition centre
on the comparison and the determination of the efficacies of facilities-based competition
against services-based competition.
The advocates of Facilities-Based Competition claim that
in
the long term, market
equilibrium will be realised when players in the market build their own facilities.
On the other hand the advocates of Service Based Competition argue that available
facilities, usually of the previous monopolies such as Telkom, should be shared. They argue
that competition should be downstream, mainly in the retail market as opposed to the
wholesale market.
These debates are playing themselves out in discussions about local loop unbundling,
regulatory forbearance in mandating access to new broadband infrastructure, the sharing of
broadband infrastructure, and wholesale or retail price regulations.
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