Zambia's telecoms regulator says that it has instituted criminal proceedings against all three mobile phone service providers namely Airtel, MTN and Zamtel, for what it says are a failure to meet minimum standards of quality of service.
The Authority (ZICTA) said that the deteriorating levels of Quality of Service has made communication difficult and resulted in increased public outcry and negative impact on ease of doing business in Zambia.
Under the published Quality of Service Guidelines, ZICTA has an option to invoke either administrative or criminal sanctions arising from the failure to adhere to the set parameters relating to quality of service.
As a consequence, the Board of the Authority, on June 27, 2013 authorized Management's decision to prosecute all the three mobile service providers for offering poor quality of service to the public.
The Authority, on July 4, 2013, instituted criminal proceedings against the mobile service providers on two counts of failure to meet minimum standards of quality of service as specified and published by the Authority contrary to Section 67 of the Information and Communication Technologies Act No. 15 of 2009, and one count of failure to comply with a provision of the Quality of Service Guidelines issued by the Authority contrary to Section 79(1) of the Information and Communication Technologies Act No. 15 of 2009 respectively.
