Two of Zimbabwe’s private cellphone companies have mounted a court challenge to new state regulations forcing them to share international traffic revenue with a state-owned company, it was reported on Monday.
Independent cellphone companies were given until November 1 to comply with a government order forcing them to route their traffic through a single international gateway run by the state’s fixed line Tel-One company.
Privately-owned cellphone companies Econet and Telecel already operate their own gateways.
Last week the two companies filed separate applications in the Harare High Court to delay the implementation of the new regulation, reports the state-controlled Herald newspaper.
They want time to challenge the constitutionality of the new law in the country’s Supreme Court, the paper said.
The service providers contend that in its effect and implementation, the regulation is demonstrably biased and favoured Tel-One.
Independent reports say that together, Econet and Telecel have a capacity for close to a million phone subscribers, outstripping the combined capacity of Tel-One and Net-One, the state-run cellphone company.
The state phone company’s dire financial predicament came to a head in September when it was disconnected from the key Intelsat link to the internet over an unpaid debt of more than $710 000.
As a result local internet service providers were temporarily thrown into disarray. Zimbabwe’s central bank had to intervene to pay the reconnection fee.
In a statement last week Econet warned that compliance with the new regulation would seriously jeopardise its capacity to meet its foreign currency obligations.
The company also warned the regulation might force it to charge local subscribers in scarce foreign currency to offset its obligations. – Sapa-DPA