Sherilee Bridge
Accusations of espionage in the cellular industry have done little to fuel confidence in the two network operators, MTN and Vodacom. They have been slammed for “petty infighting” while the market cries for reduced service costs.
In a bid for market leadership just months before the possible introduction of a third network operator, the fighting is seen as one of the worst marketing campaigns in the industry’s history.
Vodacom says it is considering legal action as evidence comes to light that “free and fair” comparative testing carried out by MTN earlier this month could have been sabotaged by a clandestine surveillance operation.
MTN has retaliated against claims that it used rigged helicopters and vehicles to interfere with Vodacom’s signal during the tests. It claims Vodacom may have had a ground team in place to monitor the proceedings – a new turn of events.
But while the networks spend thousands – investigators believe MTN spent up to R500 000 on the surveillance exercise – the public is begging for cuts in costs to allow easier entry to the cellular market.
Market entry has been aided by the subsidisation of cellphones to secure increased subscriptions. But subsidising means users are deprived of cheaper, higher-quality services because operators keep the cost of the phones artificially low.
The policy of a free phone with a new contract has damaged the market, and international operators say the South African industry is a mess.
Both MTN and Vodacom subsidise phones which would otherwise cost up to R2 600. International operators say resources would be better spent on subsidising airtime.
Even Vodacom’s latest marketing tool – free voicemail retrieval – conceals increases in costs. Users will get free voicemail from this month, but they will pay up to 4,4% more per call.
Vodacom denies that publicity given to free voicemail retrieval masks the increase, preferring to chalk the hike down to soaring capital expenditure (capex) costs as a result of the depreciating rand.
The network has earmarked R3,2-billion in capex for network expansion this year. About 70% will go offshore for equipment, with South Africa losing out on local content.
Vodacom expects its rival to follow its free-services offer, but MTN insists it will not alter its marketing strategy, saying it can compete on quality and stable tariff rates. It too has embarked on a network expansion programme to position itself for the likely entry of another operator towards the end of the year.
@TRC to probe San war atrocities
Cheryl Uys
The man who commanded 31 Battalion in the late 1970s, Colonel Piet Hall, has been invited to appear before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to answer questions about alleged atrocities perpetrated against Khoisan soldiers who served in the battalion in southern Angola.
The !Xu community, now living in a tent camp constructed by the military at Schmidtsdrif, in the Northern Cape, has laid a claim with the commission against former South African Defence Force (SADF) soldiers who were allegedly acting under Hall’s orders.
A dossier in the possession of the commission includes a claim that several San soldiers were killed and left in shallow graves in Angola, and documents the uprooting of the community from Angola to Namibia and, finally, South Africa.
“This week Colonel Hall was issued with an invitation to appear at the truth commission offices on July 15. We are preparing a detailed set of questions which the South African National Defence Force has to answer,” says truth commission investigator Zenzile Khoisan.
“Among these [questions] are why the wives have not been officially notified of the deaths and reasons for the killings of their loved ones. We would like to know from Colonel Hall if he gave orders for these killings and if not, who did. We would also like to know what reports, if any, he sent through to his superiors in respect of these deaths. We have recently interviewed a witness who has provided us with further insight into the policies of the SADF … and information regarding the destruction of key documentation which is critical to the history of the San.
“The fact is that these alleged atrocities were committed in the late Seventies, and the graves referred to by the complainants are said to be located in southern Angola. Unfortunately, the turth commission is nearing the end of its mandate and may not be able to conduct the exhumations requested by the families.
“This issue is, however, an important window matter which will be dealt with in the context of the final investigative report and recommendations will be made in respect of the San.”
Caught up in a war that wasn’t their own, the !Xu were recruited by the SADF in the Angolan war as trackers and settled at Omega base in the Caprivi Strip. They were accommodated as refugees and used as prime instruments to wage war against liberation movements in Angola and later Namibia. After Namibian independence, they were left on the wrong side of history.
The community’s late leader, Agostinho Victorino (39), demanded to know the reasons behind the killing of certain San soldiers which had not been explained to the community and their families. Before his death a month ago in a car accident in Namibia, Victorino presented a lucid account to the commission’s Khoisan, documenting missions which the San soldiers were forced to undertake in Angola, Zambia and the Caprivi strip.
Victorino’s unexpected death perpetuates the symbolic metaphor of a community in transition: transported from Namibia to South Africa, his body now lies in a temporary grave at Schmidtsdrif in a 1m- deep earth pit with a corrugated roof covered lightly with sand and colourful plastic wreathes. The next time his body is moved will hopefully be the last journey he has to make, as the !Xu continue their quest for a permanent and dignified settlement which they can call home.
In the wake of his death the San community is demanding to know what the truth commission is doing about their claims. Khoisan confirmed this week that “the San issue has not been swept under the carpet by the investigation unit. I refuse to accept that the abuses visited against the San are any less horrendous and devastating than any of the other cases investigated by our unit.”
Khoisan said when he visited the Schmidtsdrif base recently, “We paid a courtesy call on Staff Sergeant Mario Mahongo, minister and representative of the community, when the officer commanding stormed in and abruptly ordered us off the base. We refused to leave. The stand-off was averted only after negotiation with his superiors at Northern Cape Command.
“It was quite surprising – in fact, distressing – to see how the military had taken to unilaterally deciding to remove from civilians their constitutionally guaranteed right to speak freely and in confidence to the truth commission.”
Khoisan believes that the uprooting of the San and the way they were used by the military in a war that was not their own will affect them for the rest of their lives, and therefore must be fully accounted for. “This must go beyond the TRC and the South African government,” he says. “All governments in the region must account for abuses visited upon this ancient people who have been caught up in a virtual vice-grip of history.”