\n
Rwandatel<\/span> may turn to a foreign investor if a local court does not liquidate the debt-laden telecoms firm, its interim management said on Wednesday.<\/strong><\/p>\n Rwanda\u2019s telecoms regulator stripped Rwandatel<\/span> of its mobile licence<\/span> for failing to meet key performance targets in terms of investment, network roll-out, coverage and quality of service.<\/p>\n The company, 80 percent owned by the Libyan African Investment Portfolio (LAP), acquired its operating licence<\/span> in 2007 but only started mobile operations in December 2008.<\/p>\n The Rwandan government has taken custody of some Libyan-owned assets in line with an international freeze, but has not explicitly stated that the Libyan investment in Rwandatel<\/span> has been frozen, given the pending court ruling.<\/p>\n The telecoms regulator said on Wednesday it would await the court ruling to see what options there would be to protect the interests of Rwandatel<\/span> creditors.<\/p>\n Last month, a Rwandan court appointed an interim manager to oversee the company\u2019s affairs for the next two months, including paying debts of 54.3 billion Rwandan francs.<\/p>\n However, the company maintained its fixed line and data license, which accounted for 60 percent of its revenues.<\/p>\n Richard Mugisha<\/span>, the company\u2019s interim manager, dispelled media reports that foreign telecom companies, particularly Vodacom<\/span> of South Africa, were already in talks with the company and the regulator about a possible take over. <\/p>\n “I have not been approached by any telecom investor. However, if the court rules that the company shouldn\u2019t be liquidated our plan of action would definitely require the involvement of a strategic investor,” Mugisha<\/span> said.<\/p>\n “The kind of assets the company has can only be used by someone who is established in this business and understands it. Keeping, or changing the brand identity of the company, would depend on the business decision of that investor. When that time comes we will definitely interest some people,” he said.<\/p>\n According to figures presented on Wednesday, the debt includes 1.7 billion francs in interconnection fees owed to MTN<\/span> Rwanda and Millicom\u2019s<\/span> Tigo<\/span> Rwanda. It also owes the government 3.6 billion and 400 million francs in regulatory fees.<\/p>\n The company will remain 80 percent owned by the Libyan fund with the other 20 percent in the hands of Rwanda\u2019s social security fund until the court makes its ruling, the country\u2019s telecoms regulator said.<\/p>\n Before revocation of its licence<\/span>, Rwandatel<\/span> had over 500,000 subscribers, MTN<\/span> Rwanda 2.3 million and Tigo<\/span> Rwanda 700,000 clients. MTN<\/span> Rwanda was once forced to payoff Rwf<\/span> 70 million ($145,000) for failure to meet contractual obligations. <\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Rwandatel may turn to a foreign investor if a local court does not liquidate the debt-laden telecoms firm, its interim management said on Wednesday. Rwanda\u2019s telecoms regulator stripped Rwandatel of its mobile licence for failing to meet key performance targets in terms of investment, network roll-out, coverage and quality of service. The company, 80 percent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75],"byline":[277],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-homenews","byline-igihe-com-reporter"],"bylines":[{"id":277,"name":"IGIHE.com Reporter","slug":"igihe-com-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":277,"name":"IGIHE.com Reporter","slug":"igihe-com-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}