A new Open Secrets report alleges that the country’s biggest mobile firms have used political ties to protect their interests across Africa.
The political muscle behind South Africa’s mobile giants | Currency News
Originally published in Currency News
By Rob Rose
South Africa’s parliament must exercise greater oversight of mobile phone giants MTN and Vodacom to prevent them “abusing” their deep political connections, says non-profit group Open Secrets.
In a new report, Open Secrets has traced the political links of these operators, not just at home but also in countries across the continent, where the Johannesburg-based companies have been accused of allowing authoritarian regimes to act against their own people.
“For these companies to operate, they need to win mobile licences from governments. This means they have to build relationships with politicians, but we’ve seen how these relationships have been manipulated,” says Open Secrets’ investigator Ra’eesa Pather.
“In a number of cases, MTN and Vodacom have shut down the internet to help various governments, and in this darkness, those governments committed massacres. And there has been no real accountability for this at home.”
