[kictanet] 3 Media houses protest Majanja's Digital Migration Ruling

[Bitange Ndemo]

Kivuva,
Iam a supporter of building local capacities but whichever way CCK would
have given out the license, there was going to be criticism.  CCK wanted
someone capable of putting up infrastructure after we discovered Signet
was taking too long and Government did not have money.  The financial bid
for all the local firms did not measure up to what CCK had requested.

You realize CCK has gone through this journey before and were hit hard
when policy requirement needed 70 percent local participation, we got
Mobitelea.  Every policy pronouncement has some wheeler dealers behind
singing patriotism.  World over what is needed is the ability to provide
the solution.  You read the other day that China Telcom was partnering
with I-Phone yet China is the greatest producer of mobile handsets.  There
comes a time when we must accept partnerships that will help us build
capacity.  We provided that opportunity in Signet but it was declined. 
When you focus on coverage to offer essential service, you look at
capability as demonstrated in the financials.

For many years we protected KPTC as a critical infrastructure but what we
ended up with was poverty en masse.  Our people would not afford
telephony.  Ever since we liberalized the communications sector, it is now
contributing more than 5 percent to the economy up from zero percent.  It
is dangerous to focus on one aspect of migration infrastructure.  If each
of the broadcaster is given multiplexing ability, they will hoard the
spectrum and shut out new entrants just when the creative economy is
trying to pick up.  The current Media is simply trying to protect its own
interests considering the fact that we have new hard working Kenyans
entering the broadcast arena. Why would we be supportive of oligopolistic
practices when the industry is opening up to more players?

Court or no court Migration will take place and new business models will
emerge.  This is where we need to focus our attention.  The delaying
tactics you are seeing is to disenfranchise more than 100 new broadcasters
that are born and bred in this country.  I said before and would state
here that not even Signet or PANG would build a sustainable business model
without serious content aggregation strategy considering the fact that
technology changes every 3 years.

Ndemo.





> Ali, I'm afraid many listers are not getting your argument, that of
> auctioning our critical resources to foreigners.
>
> Many of us have been dragged into taking sides either for the
> government (CCK), or the local media houses. If we divorce them from
> this debate, maybe we will be more objective.
>
> Let me digress, we have enough coal in Kitui to setup a powerplant
> that can propell Kenya to vision 2030 and stop relying on poor
> rainfall and other unreliable renewable energy like geothermal. But
> what did we do with the coal? We auctioned it to the Chinese "who need
> the power more than us." That is the same thing happening to our
> spectrum resources.
>
> Forget about procurement laws and let's think about economics that
> will build the country without taking sides. Is it better to give the
> frequency distribution to a local firm, and keep local dollars local,
> or is it better to have that capital flight to China? We should even
> give the third licence FREE to a consortium of local firms than
> auction it for a Billion dollars to a foreigner.
>
> Are we a nation that has lost national pride?
>
> Remember CCK cannot have an objective stand on this since Wambua has
> to respond with the official government position, and I cannot fault
> him for that. Only civil society can take the high moral ground and do
> what is good for Kenya. Advocate for our critical resources, airwaves,
> minerals, tourism, ... to be controlled by locals.
>
> Dr. Ndemo is the economist on the list. Can he teach us why developed
> economies work so hard to support their industries, while Kenya works
> extra hard to support foreign economies? What are the repercussions on
> future generations?
>
> Anybody who cannot get this argument is beyond uncolonization.
>
> --
> ______________________
> Mwendwa Kivuva, Nairobi, Kenya
> twitter.com/lordmwesh
> kenya.or.ke | The Kenya we know
>
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