Mozambique: INCM to limit airtime bonus offered by mobile companies – Watch

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: INCM to limit airtime bonus offered by mobile companies – Watch

5:10 CAT | 21 Jul 2021

Photo: TVM

The Mozambique National Communications Institute (INCM), the regulatory body for telecommunications, has decided to limit, by the end of August, the amount of bonus the three mobile phone operators in the market may offer to subscribers every time they purchase more airtime for their phones.

The move was confirmed on Tuesday in Maputo by the INCM director general, Tuaha Mote, at a press conference where he said that mobile phone companies can still offer the bonus, as long as they it does not exceed 50 per cent of the recharge amount. Hence a recharge with the face value of 500 meticais, can carry a bonus of 250 meticais, but no more.

There has long been a commercial battle between the three mobile phone operators – the publicly owned TMcel, and the private companies Vodacom and Movitel – as they try to win more customers by offering a complex variety of bonuses and special offers.

Apparently unaware that this is how the telecommunications market works, the INCM is now attempting to halt the working of market forces, as subscribers switch from one network to another.

Mote claimed that the allegedly continuous and unlimited offer of bonuses means that the companies are unable to continue their network expansion programmes to reach those (mostly rural) areas of the country not yet covered by mobile telephony. He also alleged that the bonuses limit the capacity of the operators to innovate in their networks, and hamper improvements in the quality of the service.

“There are several reasons that led to the decision”, he said. “One of the main concerns is the great need to promote development through the implementation of government policies intended to ensure that communications reach people across the country”.

Unlimited bonuses, he added, do not benefit the great majority of the subscribers and they are not valid in certain parts of the country’s remote areas, a situation he pointed to as discriminatory.

“For instance, only 50 per cent out of the 14 million subscribers across the country have the capacity to recharge on a regular basis with more than 1,000 meticais (15 US dollars, at the current exchange rate) a month to access the unlimited bonus service,” he explained (he appeared to be referring to a Movitel package).

He acknowledged the legitimacy of the strong complaints voiced by users across the country, who are demanding that the bonuses should continue, but complained that the task of decision makers such as the INCM “is not easy and sometimes not very well understood”.

The INCM is already in retreat on this issue. Mote assured the reporters that negotiations are underway with the mobile phone operators to secure access to affordable data by educational platforms for students.

Claims that the bonuses deprive the companies of resources they might otherwise use to expand their networks are difficult to prove or disprove. But what is certain is that slashing the bonuses will have the effect of making it much more expensive to use mobile phones. Given that wages have been frozen since April 2019, the fury of subscribers is easy to understand.