South African Communications Minister Dina Pule has met with the ICT Policy Review Panel to discuss work, responsibilities and to establish an approach to the review process.
Pule met with the newly established panel, which includes industry figures and was put together in November, on Thursday and Friday (January 24 and 25).
The 22-member policy panel has agreed to take on their work in three phases. The first phase involves an assessment of South Africa’s ICT policy setting from 1994 to 2013 after which it will publish a policy review report.
Phase two involves the development of a discussion document, which will address “convergence of ICT services” through an “integrated approach”. The third and last phase includes establishing a new ICT policy framework.
“We are firmly on track to deliver the ICT policy that will propel the country into the next level of economic growth while improving the quality of services the state delivers to the citizens,” Pule said in a statement despite the furore regarding the country’s digital migration status.
The policy panel that Pule chose includes Tracy Cohen, Chief Corporate Services Officer and former Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) Councillor, Pieter Uys, Vodacom’s former Chief Executive and Atul Gupta, a member of the controversial Gupta family which owns the New Age Newspaper.
