In response to a Directive from the Minister of Industry, Technology, Energy and Commerce Honorable Phillip Paulwell, the Fair Trading Commission in collaboration with the Office of Utilities Regulation conducted a review of the telecommunications sector. The review assesses how adequate the current regulatory framework has been in achieving the Government’s stated objectives. It takes account of the development of the telecommunications sector over the past six years and future market developments which are expected to affect competition in the sector. The scope of this review is wide; and it has considered consumer issues as well as competition issues.
The review sought to answer the following questions:
- How has the sector performed in the post-liberalization period?
- How satisfied are consumers with their suppliers and the range of their service offerings?
- What are the threats to the competitive provisioning of telecommunications services?
The above issues are considered for four important segments within the telecommunications sector; the local fixed voice and access, mobile, Internet and international segments. These segments constitute the majority of the telecommunications industry and trends within them have profound impacts on end-users and the general industry structure.