MEDIA STATEMENT
South Africa’s Statement at the 2022 WTDC South Africa’s Statement at the 2022 WTDC Pledging to Connecting the unconnected to achieve sustainable development
Delivered by H.E. Minster of Communications and Digital Technologies, Ms Khumbudzo Ntshavheni
Your Excellencies
It is an honour to join this Partner to Connect session.
South Africa is implementing a Broadband Connectivity drive through a programme we call South Africa (SA) Connect. The goal of SA Connect is to ensure that all South Africans have access to the internet by 2024. The SA Connect programme is driven through 4 initiatives:
One: The Social Obligations linked to the successful auction of the spectrum which did not only raise U$ 1 billion for our national fiscus but the mobile operators will spend not less than R17 billion (equivalent to 1.3 billion US dollars) to connect all public schools, health facilities, public libraries, government service centres and traditional authorities by end June 2025.
Two: Connecting Government by ensuring that outstanding government sites are connected by end March 2024, this target is critical for our programme to digitalise government. The digitalisation programme aims to have 80% of our citizen-facing services to be online by 2025, with government planning to go paperless by end March 2023.
Three: Connecting Communities by connecting over 33000 community Wi-Fi hotspots that will provide internet service to more than 5.8 million households. With the rapid growth of Wi-Fi in complementing and off-loading mobile data traffic from fixed broadband, there is a growing need for the ITU to consider more protection of spectrum use for Wi-Fi services, including possible licensing of Wi-fi spectrum. The broadband connectivity programme will be implemented through emerging and Small and Medium Enterprises such as internet service providers, wireless access providers and mobile virtual network operators. Our intention is to create a new technology industry. For this programme, the South African government will invest over US$161 million (R2.5 billion) over a 36 months period.
Four: Satellite for communication services to enhance the reach of our broadband connectivity, South Africa is now ready to launch its own satellite. The satellite will address both media and broadband connectivity objectives and will entrench our technology and data sovereignty.
The SA Connect programme will be complimented by a robust programme to modernise our networks in partnership with industry which entails the full deployment of 4G and 5G networks by 2025. To enable this, we will shut down 2G and 3G networks over the same period and this financial year, we will commence with the prohibition of the importation and distribution in South Africa of 2G devices.
Distinguished delegates,
The most fundamental requirement for a digital world is access to broadband connectivity by all, irrespective of geographic location and economic standing. South Africa is fully committed to this, and it is for this reason that we seek your support for the re-election to the ITU Council and the Radio Regulatory Board.
Thank you
Issued by the Ministry of Communications and Digital Technologies
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Download document here: Statement: Pledging to Connecting the Unconnected: WTDC 2022
