Smart says B.T.L. is abusive but 90,000 will get intl service
Telephone users, ninety thousand of them who are subscribers of SMART may find that from early this morning they can’t make international phone calls. That’s because Belize Telemedia Limited has disconnected Smart from its international circuits. BTL has accused SMART of being the beneficiary of a sweetheart deal signed in 2004. SpeedNet Communications Limited, the company that owns Smart, issued a release this morning in which it said it pays Telemedia rates of up to fourteen thousand dollars per E1 capacity. It also claims that those rates are the highest international circuit rates in the region and Telemedia charges large corporate customers approximately five thousand dollars for similar access. To prove that it is paying Telemedia more than its fair share for its services, SpeedNet also points to the fact that it is paying one point three million dollars annually to B.T.L. for facilities it leases from it. SpeedNet is now applying to Telemedia for direct access to the Americas Region Caribbean Ring System (ARCOS-1); a fiber optic submarine communications cable of 8,400 kilometers that spans throughout the Americas and the Caribbean. SMART says it intends to pay for its share of the running cost of the ARCOS installation. SpeedNet has sought an audience with the Public Utilities Commission and the Belize Chamber of Commerce. Chamber board member Israel Marin, says that the Chamber is trying to get both SMART and Telemedia to sit down and discuss the issue. But that hasn’t happened and according to SMART’s Chief Operations Officer, Ernesto Torres, the company is still without international phone services.
Ernesto Torres, Chief Operations Officer, SMART
“Well this morning Telemedia pulled the plug on the circuits that we use for international voice. We currently have where we lease these circuits from Telemedia on a month to month basis. So obviously the lease has been cancelled unilaterally by them. We don’t think it’s something that should have been done and in fact we think that Telemedia has acted in a very abusive manner, taking advantage of its dominant position in the market to cause economic harm, not only to Speednet but to ninety thousand subscribers and businesses who depend on and who use Speednet services.”
Jose Sanchez
“Do you view it as illegal?”
Ernesto Torres
“If you have an arrangement whereby you supply a lease to a person and you break that lease without giving adequate notice because remember there was very little notice given, then there’s something inherently wrong with that. We inquired from them, if you’re going to terminate it then what is an alternative that you can offer us. In the letter they said we cannot continue to provide this to you because it is priced below cost. We said okay we’re interested in knowing what the cost should be. We wrote to them, we sent them emails but to today’s date we have no reply.”
Jose Sanchez
“Have you gone to the P.U.C.?”
Ernesto Torres
“Yes, we wrote the P.U.C. on the seventeenth of November and the only time we started hearing from the P.U.C. was when the plug was pulled. So in our opinion the P.U.C. was not proactive enough to deal with the situation before it got out of hand.”
Jose Sanchez
“So what is the P.U.C. doing now?”
Ernesto Torres
“The P.U.C. has asked us for certain information to show that we have an arrangement with Telemedia for these circuits and we have sent that to them.”
Jose Sanchez
“Why haven’t you filed for an injunction?”
Ernesto Torres
“We are exploring options right; legal and otherwise because that’s what we—one of our primary concerns right now is to make sure that our customers get back their international and we are hoping by Sunday we will get that. The way this will be solved is that Telemedia needs to grant SpeedNet access to the ARCOS submarine cable. That cable is there to be used in Belize for legitimate purposes by specially licensed carriers and there is no reason why that should be denied. Once that is provided this whole problem goes away.”
Jose Sanchez
“Do they own the ARCOS?”
Ernesto Torres
“No, they own shares in the consortium because ARCOS is a consortium. Belize owns I think like less than one percent but it’s still an owner. But there is what you call a construction and maintenance agreement that Telemedia is a signatory to, to all the other parties that make up the consortium. And if you look at that agreement they are mandated as a landing party to make that cable available to other entities in the country where the cable is because it’s for business use.”
Jose Sanchez
“Do you see it as a move towards making Telemedia a monopoly in the industry?”
Ernesto Torres
“Well, that’s clearly how the thing is looking at the moment. If you’re going to destabilize the telecommunications industry by denying ninety thousand subscribers access to international services on extremely short notice then how else do you interpret it.”
Shortly before the news began, the P.U.C. issued release asking Telemedia to renege on its decision to cut off SMART’s international lines until the matter is resolved. After hearing the news, SMART’s Chief Operations Officer said that he is glad the P.U.C. was able to see that the needs of the consumers came first. And he hopes that Telemedia would agree with the PUC’s recommendation.
