Following the recent service disruptions experienced by Digicel’s data subscribers, the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GTT) yesterday said it has the capacity to support the affected users on the rival network until the situation is resolved.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GTT Justin Nedd made the disclosure during a press conference at the Herdmanston Lodge yesterday morning. It came days after local news site Demerara Waves reported that regulators in Suriname reportedly shut down an illegal microwave link between Digicel Guyana and its counterpart in the Dutch-speaking country, which had resulted in the disruption of data service for Digicel users.
Though data users on Friday would have received a text message from Digicel acknowledging the service interruption, the company has yet to issue an official statement regarding the situation.
GTT, in a short statement on Friday, disclosed that it had made commercial offers to Digicel over an extended period to provide capacity that would resolve—and would have averted—its current network failure.
The company also noted that it had not taken action against Digicel Suriname or the Surinamese government.
These sentiments were reiterated yesterday by Nedd, who said that GTT has not commenced legal proceedings or threatened any legal proceedings in Suriname and that they recognised that the Surinamese regulators are executing their mandate.
Nedd also expressed confidence that the company is more than capable of accommodating the other users.
“I am very confident that we have the capacity and, in fact, I would like to reiterate that in March, 2018, we carried all the internet traffic for Suriname, French Guiana and Guyana and our network was resilient enough to do it because there were outages in Suriname and French Guiana at the same time,” the CEO said.
“Given the architecture of the network, the Guyana network provided enough resiliency to carry the traffic. I don’t believe that it is a matter of capacity and I want to dispel that notion without a doubt. Our network can handle the traffic,” he added.
In March 2017, GTT had called on the government to initiate an independent investigation of what it called an “illegal, unlicensed” cross-border link between Guyana and Suriname being facilitated by Digicel Guyana.
However, when asked if GTT had lodged a complaint to the Surinamese government, Nedd said, “The issue is certainly something we have raised with our government, so I think it is well document[ed] in all quarters.”
The CEO also noted that the illegal link cost GTT tens of millions of US dollars, which could have been used to invest further in the company.
“It is significant and we are trying to work through it. [We] could have been in a better place to invest had we that money, absolutely, but the fact is that we don’t and we just need to find solutions. We are focused on moving forward with solutions,” Nedd shared.
This being said, the need for there to be regularisation of the telecommunications sector was reiterated.
“We continue to press for a leveled playing field; same tax structure, equitable regulations and overall we want to see the players play by the same rules,” he stated.
Notwithstanding, Nedd explained that the company continues to work with the Government of Guyana to finalise the direction of the telecommunications industry and is very optimistic about the progress being made. “I am optimistic, we have been having productive discussions with the government and I think Minister Hughes is very optimistic about ensuring that we get some movement before the end of the year …I can’t say enough: we want to get this done, we want to get this done right and we want a level playing field for all involved in the sector,” Nedd said.
