AdvtAdvtJoin the community of 2M+ industry professionals Subscribe to our newsletter to get latest insights & analysis. The finance ministry and a spokesperson for Prime Minister Abiy did not respond to written questions about Safaricom's challenges and the incentives.Russell Southwood, the CEO of Balancing Act telecoms consultancy and author of Africa 2.0, a book about mobile and internet technology on the continent, said telecoms investors doubted the government's commitment to true competition. "You can never be quite clear what it is the Ethiopian government is doing," he said. Safaricom did not respond to a request for comment on this point.The person, who has knowledge of the telecoms licencing process, said this was one of several examples of the government favouring Ethio Telecom at Safaricom's expense, including encouraging state-owned utilities to favour Ethio Telecom's payments system. "These issues, which promote anti-competitive practices, have made other potential bidders for the third telecoms licence lose interest," the person said.

Source: Ethiopian News December 19, 2023 06:30 UTC