Filipinos, not telcos, own airwaves — solon By Charlie V. Manalo 04/09/2011

Filipinos, not telcos, own airwaves — solon

By Charlie V. Manalo 04/09/2011

Another lawmaker yesterday joined the throngs of critics against the deal forged between the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) and Digitel saying they have no right to strike a deal between themselves alone over matters concerning telecommunication services saying the airwaves are owned by all Filipinos and therefore need a legislative approval.

“The spectrum or airwaves is patrimony hence it is owned by the Filipinos and the future generations of Filipinos. A Telco cannot buy into another or just merge without affecting services, pricing and consumer rights therefore Congress should review the grant of franchise to Digitel and the sudden increase in the total frequencies PLDT will corner with the merger and in another case, Globe cannot unilaterally cap bandwidth,” said Cagayan Rep. Jack Enrile in reaction to the PLDT-Digitel merger as well as the plan of Globe Telecom to cap bandwidth to 1 GB a day for 3G and wimax..... MORE

Source:  The Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/nation/20110409nat3.html