While it was stated that, the meeting which was held at the Ankara center of the Telecommunication Foundation is considered as one of the most important meetings after the liberalization, UMTH administrators featured the decisions as “a fresh start” and “ TK has now claimed the licenses that it issued before”.
UMTH administrators are reported to have relaxed following the meeting that was held at TK today, after the stressful days since the liberalization of the telecommunications sector in 1.1.2004. It is reported that the meeting was very important for UMTH sector and that the Telecommunication Foundation gave a decision about 5 of the problems.
After all these decisions, the sector’s thoughts could be summarized as, “Telecommunication Foundation have finally claimed the licenses that it had issued in May 17th 2004.”
The meeting of Telecommunication Foundation (TK), Turkish Telecom and UMTH license holding companies’ officers was held today (February 1th) in Ankara, at the headquarters of TK. Starting the meeting, Chairman of Board, Omer Arasil pointed out that the political will wanted liberalization in telecom sector and because of this, liberal telecom administrators have a big opportunity, and said, “Political will wants this, Turkish Telecom also wants this and Telecommunication Foundation supports this. Under these circumstances there are no barriers for liberal telecom administrators in their way to success.”
One of the private sector officers said, “Today was the first time that we felt the interest of Transportation Minister Mr. Yildirim, who helped the private sector companies and therefore contributed to the increase in the number of airplanes in Turkey, in us and that he could participate in some enterprises in the telecom field.” The officials from the foundation that we interviewed on the phone, once again pointed out that the power behind the decisions made today, that could be considered as reforms, is the political will.
It is reported that, the Turkish Telecom officials that attended the meeting said that, they are going to complete their responsibilities that the duty agreement made between them and the Telecommunication Foundation vests on them.
One of the private sector officials that we interviewed about the subject said, “The sector once again had an excitement similar to the day that the license was given, that is May 17th 2004. With this decision, 9 months after the licenses had been issued, the sector is like born again.”
TK officials claimed that there is a process of transform in the sector and that problems could possibly arise from time to time and that they are going to continue to work to solve these problems.
The decisions made in the meeting today are: (decision’s original text will be available tomorrow)
The PRI and rental lines’ lending were suspended by Turkish Telecom before. In the meeting it was decided to let lending of these lines restart.
Telecommunication Foundation declared that there are no legal barriers for Call Shops (points where cheap long distance calls could be made).
The rule for UMTH companies to build up 8 pop points within 6 months or their license will be void was amended as not from starting the date of the license but the date of mid-connection agreement.
It was decided that Turkcell – Telsim could carry their total abroad traffic via the UMTH company of their choice. This decision is highly important as it sets a 170 million minutes traffic’s canalization free.
It was stated by Telecommunication Foundation that finishing through ISDN lines is not a crime. Before that, Turkish Telecom was identifying this as a crime. TK declared that this is a right for the UMTH companies.
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