05 February 2022
Vimbayi Mahachi
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The past week was awash with news to the effect that one of Zimbabwe’s mobile cellular carriers, Telecel, has shut done.
Zim GBC News reporter consulted the company’s Public Relations Officer (PRO) Zitha Ncube who discredited the news as false.
Zitha however acknowledged that Telecel is experiencing network challenges.
“Telecel Zimbabwe would like to draw the public’s attention to the current network challenges that it has been experiencing intermittently. At the moment customers are failing to make voice calls and at times access data services,” she said.
She attributed the problems to software on the main Mobile Switching Controller (MSC) which is said to have expired. She added that the problem has since been rectified through the renewal (update) of the software.
The MSC connects calls between subscribers by switching the digital voice packets between network paths.
Telecel reports that,
“Government has a 60% stake in Telecel after its takeover in 2016.”
According to research Telecel was one of the country’s first telecommunications networks in Zimbabwe. It was founded in 1996 as a subsidiary of Telecel International, a company owned by Rwandan-born billionaire Miko Rwayitare.
The company was 60% owned by Telecel International and 40% owned by the Empowerment Corporation, a consortium of local empowerment groups.
Telecel bid for and won a telecommunications licence in early 1997. The awarding of a telecoms license to Telecel Zimbabwe was announced on 28 February 1997 by then Minister
Telecommunications, Joice Mujuru.
Although it was the first cellular mobile company to be given an operating licence.
Telecel has lagged behind its other two competitors Econet and Netone.
Econet has become the biggest mobile telecommunications company in Zimbabwe, Netone being second and Telecel taking the last slot.
Zim GBC News
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