The Information, Communication and Technology empowerment charter is to come into effect in March next year, the ICT empowerment working group said on Thursday.
Chairperson Dali Mpofu told reporters in Johannesburg the fourth and final draft of the charter would be released on August 23.
”Once the document is out constituencies in the industry would be given a chance to comment up until the end of September when it will be handed to the government.”
The communication department would then submit the document to the Cabinet.
”We… expect the charter to be operational in the next financial year by March 1, 2005.”
Mpofu also announced that an agreement was signed between the working group and the American chamber of commerce, which represents multinationals.
The agreement was reached on Wednesday night and the signing of the pact took place on Thursday.
”This development is significant because it was a major issue and now we can comfortably say the end is in sight,” he said.
”We’ve had robust discussions which had caused some delays but we were able to stick to the task at hand and the results prove this.”
Mpofu said another cause of delay was the large number of suggestions received from the local industry in response to the third draft of the charter.
Bilateral talks between the government and the industry had reached significant consensus on a number of contentious issues, which were raised in the third draft, he said.
There were still a few outstanding issues. Stakeholders expected these to be resolved by the end of August and to be in the last draft.
The document would also include the results of discussions with the Independent Communication Authority of SA (Icasa) and labour unions.
Mpofu said the government and the working group were confident the intended commencement date of the charter would be achieved.
”The final document will be launched well before the end of the year. Thereafter the ICT BEE Council will be appointed to take over the administration of the charter with effect from the commencement date –March 1, 2005.”
Communication Minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri said at the media briefing she was proud of how the process of the developing of the charter had been carried out.
”This process is very exhausting and sensitive to the broad stakeholders. Having emerged from the general election, the ruling party received the overwhelming mandate from the electorate to deliver and I am glad to say we are contributing to those expectations,” she said.
Matsepe-Casaburri thanked multinationals for not stalling the drafting of the charter and invited them to a dialogue.
”We need to engage with multinationals to ensure there is harmonisation and we speak with one voice.”
Icasa chairperson Mandla Langa said the drawing up of the charter fell in line with his organisation’s mandate of regulating ICT.
”The charter is an important initiative. Icasa will ensure it succeeds and is subjected to rigorous scrutiny,” he said. – Sapa