Zimbabwe: Annual subscription of an essential service not paid up

The backbone of Zimbabwe's telecommunications, data and internet services, Telone, did not pay their annual subscription of approximately US$3000 to AfriNIC an internet governing body that allocates addresses to all African networks. AfriNIC has threatened to block most of the IP addresses connecting the entire Zimbabwe's internet network if it doesn't get that money soon. If that happens most of the nation of Zimbabwe will be shutdown from the rest of the world in terms of internet connection. Despite constant reminders since the beginning of this year 2009, that
money still hasn't been paid and if I were to dig around for more information I am sure I will also find out that there are many other very important annual subscriptions that haven't been paid up. If they didn't pay AfriNIC then it probably means that our internet uplink providers like Intelsat, Teleglobe, Equant and SAIX where probably not paid as well. That is on the internet side, so what more on the voice network side which involves a lot of inter-connection charges between countries to be paid up. To make matters worse there are some very essential parts for the proper functioning of the Mazoe satellite dish that went faulty years back and still haven't been replaced and if you hear how small the amount needed to buy the new part is you will wonder if Telone management is serious with their work.

US$3000 should not be a lot of money for a big company like Telone that is the backbone of Zimbabwe's telecommunications, data and internet services so the question is why hasn't such a small amount of money been paid up yet. Is it because Telone the giant Titanic has finally sank after many years of mismanagement or is this a reflection of the mismanagement that is slowly sinking the company? The
employees at Telone can actually testify how the company is sinking and has been paying them a pittance of a salary for the past two years up until now with this month's salary being as little as 90Trillion Zimbabwean dollars which is equivalent to 20US dollars at today's exchange rate. Working for Telone has become a community service or a form of voluntary slavery because by merely coming to work employees are
actually subsidising the company and not the other way round. Or are these the results of POTRAZ the telecommunications governing body, governing Telone in such a way that it doesn't make profits, always refusing to approve Telone's profitable tariff proposals and insisting that they base their tarrif increases on very old assets that can never justify a tariff increase which is in line with the hyper-inflationary economic environment in Zimbabwe? Makes me think of the minimalist view that is sometimes very good for business, which is based on the underpining
philosophy that a governing body that governs least is best. Or is this because of Gono,the Reserve Bank governor, not allocating Telone the foreign currency that they need to pay out their subscriptions.? Or is the problem bigger than what I have mentioned above and actually the dictatorship government's way of censorship, cutting away bloggers like me and online media from communication with the rest of the world.? Whatever the reason is Zimbabweans are not amused.

This I am sure is one example of the Reserve Bank governor's priority list that is questionable. How he runs around so fast to buy expensive cars, plasma televisions and satellite dishes for the Zanu PF elites and is so fast to give them foreign currency at very low exchange rates as a holiday allowance but when it comes to
allocating foreign currency for essential services like communications and the buying of chemicals needed by the water authority to purify recycled water so that it is germ-free leaves it until it has become a crisis. All those former ministers and parliamentarians who used to complain about how he has practically taken over the running of the country have all gone quiet now after Gono bought their loyalty with latest model four wheel drive cars. Let me digress a bit. Is it just me or have you Zimbabweans noticed that since the time Gono insisted that all companies given a license to trade in US dollars should bank their foreign currency everyday the US dollar has become so scarce on the ground as if once the money goes to the Reserve bank it is no longer circulating.? Is this because the reserve bank of Zimbabwe is restricting the free circulation of the US dollar by taking ages to allocate companies the foreign currency they would have applied for.? If so what is the reason for doing that? Is there a reason or is it merely incompetence.?