A fibre-optic cable company worker gets ready to work. South Sudan plans
to lay a fibre-optic cable to bring broadband Internet to its citizens
in the next two years. PHOTO | FILE |
NATION MEDIA GROUP
By REUTERS
In Summary
- The government will lay 1,600 kilometres of fibre across the country and link it with undersea cables via Uganda and Tanzania, at a yet to be specified cost.
South Sudan plans to lay a fibre-optic cable to
bring broadband Internet to its citizens in the next two years, its
minister for telecommunications and postal services said.
Africa's newest nation, which gained independence
from Sudan in 2011 but was plunged into an internal conflict in December
2013, has telecoms operators such as Vivacell but lacks the
infrastructure to offer high speed Internet connections.
Rebecca Joshua Okwaci said late on Tuesday that
the government will lay 1,600 kilometres of fibre across the country and
link it with undersea cables via Uganda and Tanzania, at a yet to be
specified cost.
"I believe in a year and a half, going to two
years, we can connect it," Okwaci told said on the sidelines of an
information communication technology meeting at the Kenyan coastal
resort of Diani.
The ministry said at the start of 2013 that it
planned to lay a fibre-optic cable that year, before war broke out.
Okwaci said the conflict that started in 2013 would not deter the
ministry from its aim of linking South Sudan to the information
superhighway, citing calm in places such as the capital.
Thousands have been killed and more than a million
people have fled their homes after the fighting that broke out
following a dispute between President Salva Kiir and his former deputy
Riek Machar.
South Sudan is part of a single area network that
brings together telecom operators in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda and has
greatly reduced cross-border call charges.
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