All Africa

The East Africa PC market, which covers Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Ethiopia, shrank 6.4% year on year to 207,385 units. These results were released by IDC, the premier global market intelligence and advisory firm for the information technology and telecommunications markets.

The remaining assets of liquidated telecoms operator Rwandatel are now up for sale, AllAfrica reports, citing lawyer Richard Mugisha, who is in charge of the administration process. In April 2012 Rwanda’s newest cellular operator Airtel agreed to acquire mobile tower infrastructure from Rwandatel for RWF9.3 billion (USD15.5 million) to ease its entry into the market.

Olusegun Aganga, Nigeria’s trade and investments minister, has revealed the government will partner with computer manufacturing company Omatek in a bid to promote indigenous technology. The minister disclosed this after a tour of Omatek’s facilities at its headquarters in Lagos.

Cameroon regulator Agence de Regulation des Telecommunications (ART) has refused to accept proposed mobile tariffs pitched by operators MTN and Orange for authorisation based on dissatisfaction over suggested off-peak discounts.

 This follows ART appeals to operators to decrease mobile service fees for off-peak times, with specific reference to voice calls, to make communication in the West African country more affordable.

Soul Food Ministries International (SFMI) in Ghana said it has trained another 900 young people in the use of ICT through its 'free for all' training initiative, which has been running since 2009, GNA reported.

Eddie Letsa, General Overseer of SFMI, said the aim is to provide young people with employable skills in IT. He said the project is a non-denominational training package intended to improve the welfare of young people in society. To date, over 4,000 peoples have benefited from the courses, which cover a range of software programs and hardware training.

The Zimbabwean cellular operator Econet Wireless is targeting 100% network coverage in the country by 2015, up from around 74% currently and just 13% three years ago. The firm says the dollarisation of the economy, which saw the local Zimbabwe dollar replaced by the US dollar under a multi-currency system in 2009, and improving political stability have helped create a sound platform for investment in infrastructure. 

The Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) has teamed up with Orient Bank and Warid Telecom to come up with an efficient tax payment method where taxpayers can have the comfort of clearing their taxes through the mobile money platform.

The Namibia Competition Commission (NaCC) has issued a decision approving Telecom Namibia’s proposed takeover of cellular operator Powercom (trading as Leo) provided the buyer meets certain conditions aimed at ensuring fair competition in the market. The NaCC stipulated that the shareholding structure of Telecom Namibia and the country’s mobile market leader Mobile Telecommunications (MTC) must be ‘separate and independent’ within two years (by 24 April 2014).