The fallout between telecom operators and the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD’s) eAfrica Commission continues to deepen, with latest wrangles prompting the Commission to change the name of the region’s premier fibre cable. South African officials have said they are abandoning the name East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy), under which the initiative has been promoted since 2002, to The Nepad Broadband Infrastructure Network (NBIN). Telecom operators, who originated the idea of EASSy, have recently told the Commission to find its own name (see interview on page 3).

It is anticipated that late 2008 is the earliest the cable that will link the eastern coast of Africa to the international fibre optic system could get operational. That is three years from the finish date of June 2005 the initiators of EASSy had anticipated in November 2002. Earlier in 2006, projections were that the project would become commercially operational in the second quarter of 2007, but once NEPAD effectively took over the driver’s seat from telecom operators, a new completion date of first quarter of 2008 was given.

Donald Nyakairu, chair of the finance committee of EASSy Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signatories, told CIPESAFOCUS that the name ‘EASSy’ was their baby and they did not expect the Commission to use it.

Separately, Dr Edmund Katiti, the Commission’s Policy and Regulatory Affairs Advisor, said in an interview with CIPESA that EASSy was adopted and incorporated into the ICT Broadband Infrastructure Network for Eastern & Southern Africa, developed by stakeholders in June 2004, and was a key component of that network. In November 2004, that network was adopted by the NEPAD Heads of State and Government Implementation Committee as a NEPAD flagship project. “In this context, The NEPAD e-Africa Commission, acting within its mandate as NEPAD’s task team for the ICT sector, is coordinating efforts of the governments of Eastern and Southern Africa to put in place a policy and regulatory framework under which this regional ICT broadband infrastructure network should be built,” he said.

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