Congo's mobile operators are working to comply with the regulator's quality of service recommendations to avoid possible sanctions. Under this plan, Airtel Congo and MTN Congo signed an agreement last December 9 to improve the quality of telecoms services on national roads 1 and 2.

The partners say they will now ensure that signal is received seamlessly along both routes. Speaking during the signing ceremony, Louis Marc Sakala (pictured), MD of the Regulatory Agency for Posts and Electronic Communications (Arpce) of Congo, regretted that "there are still many white zones (territory not covered by a mobile network, ed) along our two national roads. In case of accident or breakdown, it is difficult for users to reach the nearest population or families.”

As a reminder, the regulator conducted tests on the quality of telecom services across the country from February 15 to April 9 and from June 29 to August 2, 2021. Results revealed many white zones and Arpce said there has been no improvement so far.

Hailing MTN and Airtel’s initiative, Louis Marc Sakala encourages them to respect their commitment. He stressed that infrastructure sharing will be further promoted next year through the national roaming project, whose activation has also been initialed by the collaboration between the two telecom companies.

"We have demanded that operators enable national roaming. This will allow us not to have to change our SIM card when we are in an area not covered by our operator," Louis Marc Sakala said.

Muriel Edjo