South Africa Communications policy

Telkom is absolutely terrible. Have a look here [hellkom.co.za] for more info. Telkom have consistently been a stumbling block to technological progress in the country, especially with regards to internet access. Telkom owns all the international links to the rest of the world from SA, and most of the bandwidth and international calls have to be routed through them. In fact, the price of ADSL has been so prohibitive that many individuals have pursued cellular alternatives, paying per MB, for light browsing instead. While it's easy to criticise the private companies who have been managing it, Telkom is a parastatal, and not wholly private; roughly 39% is still owned by the South African government, so I'm fairly certain they weren't too unhappy about the affair. There has been evidence of cronyism at the company, too, most likely as a direct result of this: in 2004 a government pension fund [bbc.co.uk] was used "to buy telecoms shares for a group of former government officials". This was part of the government's Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) requirements that firms need to be 1/4 black owned before 2010, and falls within a pattern shown [csmonitor.com], by 2004 government surveys, that "68 percent of BEE deals went to just 6 black-owned businesses, all of which were owned by top members of the ANC party."

The whole thing stinks, and Saffas get screwed, as usual.