Following what has been published by one of the daily newspapers under the title “Companies pressure to withdraw the fourth unified license file from the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT)”, the Ministry would like to clarify the following:
- MCIT totally denies rumors that the Egyptian Cabinet’s has withdrawn the Unified License file from the Ministry. On the contrary, it gave the Minister of ICT in the meeting dated 27 March 2014 a mandate to take charge of the file. The mandate comprised a decision from the PM to form a committee presided by the ICT Minister, other ministries’ representatives and expert members to look into best mechanisms to establish a national entity for the development of the infrastructure considered the main backbone for the ICT sector.
The first meeting of the committee took place on May 18 and more meetings were also held. The fourth meeting of the committee chaired by the Minister of ICT Atef Helmy was conducted this morning, to set the best mechanisms to establish the national entity and study the best alternatives to remove Telecom Egypt from Vodafone company.
- The Minister of ICT regularly meets with Telecom companies’ representatives and officials and maintain open channels with them
- UK ambassador meeting with Egypt’s Premier took place in the presence of the Minister of ICT Atef Helmy, NTRA Chairman Hesham El-Alayly, and Vodafone- Egypt representatives. Consultations tackled the significant role of the Unified License to activate the telecom market in Egypt, as well as new investments Vodafone intends to pump into the Egyptian market in the future to improve and expand the infrastructure
- MCIT clarifies that all concerned companies positively participate in working groups to finalize technical details and measures of the preliminary phase of the Unified License. This is in addition to the weekly meetings held between NTRA chairman and Telecom companies CEOs, to coordinate setting mechanisms to develop the telecommunications sector.
- Finally, MCIT would like to make it clear it had not received any remarks from companies currently studying details of the Unified License system. Their comments will be sent as soon as the study is finalized. The Ministry and affiliated bodies work afoot to deal with suspended issues to finalize measures of the Unified License system in line with the PM decree and in coordination with concerned companies.
