The Civil Society Consortium on Service Delivery has on Wednesday given telecom and internet service providers 14 day ultimatum to pay their service levy of 0.75% of their gross income to the Universal Access Development Fund (UADF) or face embarrassment.
UADF was established by government through the Telecommunications Act of 2006 and statutory instruments on 17th October 2019. The law provides that the levy should be paid to UADF on 1st January of every.
National Coordinator of the CSO Consortium on Service Delivery, William Sao- Lamin, told a news conference in Freetown that despite the law, Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) defaulted on their payments rendering the UADF broke and ineffective to carry out its mandates.
The mandates of UADF are: promote social and economic development by providing efficient access to and use of communications systems and services throughout Sierra Leone, focusing on rural remote and under-service areas; ensure reasonable availability and affordability of basic and advanced communications systems and services to persons with disabilities, at the household and individual levels; support the development of information and communication technologies, including related human capacity and technological innovations; and provide support for the introduction and expansion of communication services to schools, health facilities and other organisations serving public needs among others.
A licenses holder who fails to pay a universal access and service levy under subsection Commits an offence and is liable to a penalty not exceeding 25% of the levy and an interest of 5% thereon; and shall be ineligible for the renewal of his license under section 28 of the Act.
Sao-Lamin said that Orange-SL, Africell, and Sierratel have been paying the levy but payments were made late. He said that Internet Service Providers have not been paying at all even though they are making profits.
Sao Lamin said that, it is against this backdrop that they are calling for “closure of the Mobile Network Operators and Internet Service Providers who fail to meet the payment regulations; MNOs and ISPs who have failed to pay within the last two years should comply with the backlog payments with immediate effect; telecommunications under-serviced areas should be provided with the facilities as mandatory regulations; that all MNOs and ISPs should provide their financial statements 2019 to the National revenue Authority (NRA) within the 14 days ultimatum”.
“We therefore crave the indulgence of all MNOs and ISPs to comply with the law to prevent any embarrassment or sanctions within 14 days,” he said.
By Sallieu S. Kanu
2/7/2020.ISSUE NO.: 7856