UCC on the spot over spam calls and messages

Photo by Lubowa Abubaker

What you need to know:

Separately, committee members pressed the officials to explain why some radio stations including Buganda Kingdom radio, CBS FM, is operating without a licence

Parliament:
Unexplained irregularities at Uganda Communications Commission and absence of a national standard to police telecom firms explains why more than 17 million mobile-phone subscribers are paying for unsolicited messages and calls, MPs heard yesterday.

The House committee on Commissions Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises heard that because of the “unexplained absence” of a consolidated document on the national communications standards, licencing guidelines to operators are inadequate and cannot stop Ugandans from losing money to spam SMS and promotional calls.

Unsolicited text messages and calls cost phone users between Shs150 to Shs500 per instance.
“People are suffering because of the incompetence of UCC,” Mr Ibrahim Ssemujju (Kyadondo East), the committee chairperson, said.

A review by the Office of the Auditor General of UCC’s activities vis-a-vis the Uganda Communications Act, 1997 revealed the agency may not be fulfilling certain provisions of its mandate.

The Auditor General in a June 2011 report to Parliament said: “Failure to set communication standards may lead to poor service by operators.”

UCC officials led by Mr Jonas Bantulaki, the director broadcasting, yesterday insisted that UCC developed standards for different services but are not integrated into one unit.

Separately, committee members pressed the officials to explain why some radio stations including Buganda Kingdom radio, CBS FM, is operating without a licence.

However the officials explained that there was a pending court case but Mr Ssemujju ruled them out reminding them that the case had nothing do with the lack of a licence.

closure of CBS radio
Accused. The government, through UCC closed CBS, among other radio stations in 2009, accusing them of breaching regulations governing broadcasting by promoting ethnic hatred which led to the September 2009 Buganda riots.