One principle LIRNEasia defended consistently over the discussions at UN ESCAP about the Asia Pacific Information Superhighway (APIS) was that of open access. And despite many entreaties we held firm that the fiber had to owned by any entity other than the incumbent telecom operator in the country passed by the APIS fiber. From the time we conducted the Afghanistan sector performance review in 2011-12, I’ve been waiting for reports on the fiber investment paying off. But all that it appears to have yielded are vacuous presentations at international organizations. I hope that President Ghani will remove the fiber network from the dog-in-the-manger incumbent Afghan Telecom and allow the entire economy to benefit from the USD 130 million investment.
There is a certain arrogance in coverage of developing countries by Western reporters. They assumed that Ooredoo, managed by Westerners, and Telenor in particular would simply walk over MPT. That was the case in places like Bangladesh where the government did not act to reform the incumbent. But MPT is managed by KDD. They also did not take into account the advantage of having land.
Incumbent telcos see competition as an unmitigated evil. But what happens is that competition energizes the market and creates new demand. If the incumbent is decently managed, it can catch some (and possibly most) of this demand. After all, it is the known brand. And competitors have their own problems in the start-up phase.
In Sri Lanka, the incumbent teleco is a healthy company that gives decent service, lots of patronage benefits and some contributions to Treasury. It did not shed any employees, other than through voluntary schemes. In Bangladesh and India, the incumbents are at death’s door. The difference is that Sri Lanka government partially privatized the company in 1997, giving management control to the Japanese investor. Thanks to another Japanese partner, it looks like the Myanmar MPT company will not join the incumbents requiring life support.
I am all for the issuance of new licenses in Nepal, a country with a population of 30 million and fewer mobile operators (officially) than its South Asian peers. But the justification is novel. Seems to solution the described problem afflicting Nepal Telecom is some kind of program to reform it, including, but not limited to, privatization. But anyway, good that something is being done. Of course, there is many a slip between cup and lip.