adminIn an interview on the sidelines of the 8th annual general meeting of Aricesa in Victoria Falls recently, he said it was an honour that the country had assumed chair of the association.
“We are excited that we are going to chair the association for the next 12 months. There are a few challenges to do with building capacity of the association we are faced with but overall we are happy to take over,” he said.
Mr Marisa said the country was taking over the chairmanship at a time when there are topical issues like the harmonisation of telecommunications policies to be adopted by the member countries before the 2015 deadline when countries should move from analog to digital technology.
“In terms of digital technology, we have to move as a region so that there won’t be any interference in service as some would have gone to digital while others are still on analog.
“We are also taking over when issues to do with ICT use are very topical, these are critical issues when we talk of digital migration in the broadcasting sector. We are also concerned about the quality of service in the mobile network service and is common in all the member countries,” he said.
Aricesa secretary general Dr Abu Sufian Dafalla said at a time when there was growth in ICT, telecommunications regulators had a major role to play in ensuring that consumers were protected.
He said issues of security of member states and consumers against cyber-crime were very pertinent.
“Most people are now using smart phones and so cyber-crimes are now common and therefore the need to protect consumers using e-banking, e-filing and all that. That is why we need policies to protect the infrastructure to give confidence to the users. We need a safe cyber space and a quality service for different services on the cyber,” he said.
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