“Are you tired of overpriced telephone and internet charges, bad service when you order or move a telephone line or months of waiting for an ADSL connection? Then tell us and tell the world.”
These are the words of the newly formed Telecoms Action Group, which is calling on South African businesses and private individuals to donate money to take out a full-page advertisement in a national newspaper protesting against the lack of alternatives in the country’s telecommunications sector.
“We want to send a clear message to the South African government that Telkom’s high prices and poor service levels, together with a general lack of momentum in opening up the telecoms sector to competition, are hurting South African businesses and households,” says Richard Frank, an IT journalist who leads the campaign.
“A full-page advert, paid for by hundreds of South African businesses and individuals, should do this.”
The action group says a full-page advert in a national newspaper such as the Mail & Guardian will require approximately R50Â 000. By 3pm on Wednesday, R2Â 700 had already been pledged on the group’s website — 5,4% of the total.
The campaign draws inspiration from the Spread Firefox Campaign, which took out a double-page spread in The New York Times on December 16 last year to celebrate the launch of the open-source Mozilla Firefox browser. The Firefox advert listed thousands of donors’ names, who each contributed $30 or more to ensure the advert was published.
The South African campaign will also publish the names of contributors, which Frank says will create a larger impact. “It’s one thing for a big organisation or association to take out an advert; it’s another for literally hundreds of people at a grassroots level to put their names to an advert saying, ‘Enough is enough,'” he says.
Frank has received dozens of e-mails from irate Telkom users who have pledged their support. “The spectrum has been huge. We’ve had messages of support from CEOs, managers, small-business owners, academics, lawyers, IT specialists and others from all walks of life. It’s clear that this situation affects nearly every consumer in South Africa.”
The campaign is being run by Tectonic, a leading technology news website in South Africa. For months, Tectonic editor Alastair Otter has updated the website via cellphone because Telkom has still not completed the installation of an ADSL line at his new office.
“The campaign comes out of the utter frustration and disillusionment that we feel over the telecoms sector in South Africa,” says Otter. “We’re being let down by policymakers in this country who have failed to grasp how important a competitive environment is in the global economy.”
The Telecoms Action Group’s advert is planned to be run on October 20 2006. “We’ve set up a pledge database on Tectonic where consumers can pledge their support and the amount they are prepared to contribute,” says Otter. “Once we’ve received enough pledges to take out the advert, we’ll open a bank account into which donations can be placed.”
Although the advert is only scheduled to run once, Frank says the gesture could mobilise South African consumers to sustained action on the issue. “The advert will contain a bold statement that expresses how government, Icasa [the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa] and Telkom are killing our businesses, affecting our lives and hurting South Africa,” he says. “It will also inform readers on how they can get actively involved in the fight for telecoms reform.”
There has already been talk of doing more than one advert, Frank says. “However, I am not sure in what way we might move forward. It may not be print-based; we could use other media, or do something completely different.”
On the site, the Telecoms Action Group also says the country’s eagerly awaited second network operator (SNO) won’t make any significant impact in the short term. The SNO “is not a magic pill for the South African ICT industry”, it says. “Our three major cellphone companies and four major banks have proven that anti-competitive practice is the norm in South Africa, even in the absence of a monopoly.”
Lulu Letlape, Telkom group executive for corporate communication, told the Mail & Guardian Online on Wednesday that Telkom acknowledges the various challenges that still need to be overcome regarding service levels.
“In order to ensure that the customer remains central to all Telkom’s business decisions and service offerings, various proactive strategies have already been initiated,” she said.
“We believe it is in the best interest of the company and our customers to provide a service that meets customer expectations. For instance, in order to make Telkom a truly customer-centric organisation, the company has established a customer-centricity office. Telkom is confident that its customer base across all segments would soon begin to experience the benefits of the company’s initiatives.”