The mobile operator Africell is accusing Unitel of “extortion”, for charging very high prices for access to infrastructure, whose sharing is defined by law, reveals the Jornal Expansion, in its most recent edition.
According to what informs the national newspaper, this attitude of the Unitel already caused Africell Africell to fail to start marketing twice – it was supposed to be last year, moved to February of this year and now points to April.
"The Angolan Government said that there would be no problems with access to infrastructure and we were waiting for that sharing with Unitel. But the negotiations for that share did not go well, as Unitel literally tried to extort us with unaffordable prices“, said an Africell source to Expansão.
"Then there is another issue, some of the few infrastructures that were willing to share are now very old-fashioned, of poor quality and only allow, for example, the installation of equipment from a single operator. As Unitel had practically no competition, they did not make the necessary investments to improve these infrastructures. It was frustrating. We ended up investing a lot of money to install our own infrastructure,” admitted the source.
Still speaking to the newspaper, the declarant says that the “Unitel tried, in this way, to make access to infrastructure as difficult as possible, to stop competition. They tried to stop us from entering the Angolan market. It seems that they are afraid of competition, but history shows us that competition is always positive".
BUT: [RUMOR] 95 WILL BE AFRICELL'S PHONE PASSWORD IN ANGOLA, AND IT WILL START OPERATING NEXT APRIL!!!
To counter the revelations, Unitel denied the version of those responsible for Africell, revealing that the sharing of infrastructures is regulated by the legal regime of Presidential Decree n.º 166/14 of July 10th, claiming to have rejected the sharing on the 27th September 2021, in accordance with article 18, paragraph a) “where the refusal of the division in question is technically and physically unfeasible".
This rejection, according to the operator Unitel, came almost two months after Africell asked them (on July 30, 2021) “to check if it had sites [transmission points] in 100 geographic points of Luanda for proper sharing. In order to complete the specification of what they intended to place, only on August 23, 2021, Africell concludes on the specification of the equipment to be implemented in Unitel's towers, namely the weight of the equipment, as well as the energy needed and the space needed".
In a statement, Unitel reveals that on October 15, 2021, and “according to the letter of displeasure to the CEO of Africell, Unitel gave references of prices aligned with the region, namely with the international TowerCo, mainly Helios Towers and IHS, as well as indications at the level of the national market where Unitel rents sites", thus refuting Africell's accusation about the application of "unjustifiable prices".
