Radar: Malatsi orders Icasa to rewrite network-sharing rules, with a first report due in a year

Communications minister Solly Malatsi has told Icasa to rewrite the rules that decide how operators share towers, ducts and other network infrastructure, and to build new rules for rolling out networks faster. The policy direction was published in the Government Gazette on 20 October, after a draft went out for comment in March.

For people who pay for fibre and mobile data, the reason is cost. "The policy direction is ultimately aimed at reducing the cost of broadband communication," Malatsi said. Every duplicate trench and every stalled lease negotiation ends up in the price of a connection, and the 2010 Facilities Leasing Regulations that govern sharing predate most of today's fibre networks.

The direction is specific about tasks and vague about dates.

Confirmed: what Icasa has been told to do

Icasa must review the 2010 Facilities Leasing Regulations to account for changes to the Electronic Communications Act and court rulings since then. According to TechCentral's reading of the direction, that review must include a list of "essential facilities" that operators can be required to share, and Icasa must consider setting wholesale rates. It must also shorten the time taken to agree and carry out leasing deals and strengthen monitoring, including requiring operators to file their agreements with the regulator.

The Electronic Communications Act has required an essential facilities list since 2005. The 2010 regulations never produced one.

Icasa must also draft rapid deployment regulations. These should discourage unnecessary duplication where existing infrastructure is available, while allowing new builds for resilience, quality of service or a different product.

The regulator has to set up a dispute process between operators and landowners. TechCentral reports that a dispute must be declared at least 14 calendar days before an operator starts work that needs access to land, that building cannot continue while the dispute is open, and that landowner disputes go to Icasa only if the landowner agrees. Compensation disputes go to court.

Icasa must also build a national GIS database of communications infrastructure "as a priority", with licensees updating their data at least once a year.

The dates on the calendar

The firmest deadline is a report. Icasa's first annual progress report to the minister is due within 12 months, which puts it around 20 October 2027.

TechCentral reports that Icasa's final rapid deployment regulations are planned for the 2026/27 financial year, which ends on 31 March 2027. The direction sets no deadline for the facilities leasing review itself and none for municipalities, which issue the wayleaves that operators say slow them down most.

A separate route is still in Parliament. The Electronic Communications Amendment Bill, tabled in April, would give Icasa 12 months to publish the essential facilities list and 18 months to set pricing rules, once it becomes law.

Not settled

The draft drew 16 written submissions, most of them supportive, according to the department. Support was not unanimous on the detail. Telkom warned that a central map of network routes could be used by "construction mafia associates, anarchists and spies". The Association of Comms and Technology said the framework "places increased procedural obligations on licensees while core challenges remain largely unaddressed".

Icasa has not said when it will publish a discussion document on either set of regulations. Until it does, the only fixed point in the timetable is the progress report due by October 2027.