WE'LL STRIKE SASATEL OFF REGISTER, WARNS TANZANIA COMMUNICATIONS REGULATORY AUTHORITY

TCRA Director General, John Nkoma.

Dar es Salaam. The Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) is planning to revoke Dovetel (T) Limited’s licences as the mobile opertator has failed to comply with the rules of the game.

Dovetel which trades as Sasatel has failed to both roll out services nationally and pay regulatory fees as required by the regulations, the regulator said in a statement yesterday.

According to TCRA, Dovetel has been in material breach of licence conditions particularly section 21 (g) and (h) of the Electronic and Postal Communications Act, Cap 306 of the laws of Tanzania.

TCRA director general John Nkoma told The Citizen in an emailed interview recently that it granted Dovetel an opportunity to explain the situation on what is going on in the company, but Dovetel failed to respond accordingly.

On May  23, 2014, the regulator issued to Dovetel a compliance order to appear before it, and show cause why legal action should not be taken against them for being in material breach of the licence conditions but they did not respond. 

“The licensee did not show up or comply with the compliance order,” said Prof Nkoma.

Dovetel was granted by the authority four licences. They were the national network facilities licence, national network services licence, national application services licence and frequency user licence.

“The authority carried out inspection of the licensee and found out that it is not operating and its offices are closed down. The authority is in the process of revoking Dovetel’s licences,” said Prof Nkoma.

According to TCRA, with the licences, Dovetel was required to roll out services nationally as per its roll-out plans.

In the beginning of its operations, Dovetel made a good roll-out mission in Dar es Salaam region. 

However, the said licensee failed to roll out in other regions and was not utilizing scarce resources (spectrum and numbering resources).

The Citizen