3:26:42 PM | 7/8/2005
The Ministry of Defense has recently sent a document to the Prime Minister to report about the difficult situation of its Viettel mobile phone network due to monopolistic operations of the Vietnam Post & Telecoms Corp. (VNPT).
In the document, the ministry asks the Prime Minister to interfere into the situation to protect the legitimate interests of over 700,000 subscribers of the Viettel Mobile network, run by the Military Telecoms Corp.
Over the last month, the switch operator of the Viettel Mobile network has been jammed with complaints about network congestion and many Viettel Mobile subscribers have been unable to make phone calls to other networks run by VNPT, the document says.
According to a Viettel official, the situation has resulted from VNPT’s move to limit the connection between Viettel Mobile network and VNPT’s networks, including Vinaphone and MobiFone. Currently, only 50 per cent of the phone calls from Viettel can connect to VNPT’s networks.
Since the beginning of this year, Viettel has sent eight documents to VNPT to ask the corporation to remove the limit on connection. However, nothing has been done since then. VNPT explained that its switchboards are operating at full capacity and it is facing difficulty in expanding the switchboards.
“VNPT needs to invest only US$2 million or 0.5 per cent of its annual investment to upgrade the switchboards,” said the Viettel official, adding that Viettel paid VNPT US$30 million last year to connect to VNPT’s networks.
To face the situation, Viettel has also asked VNPT for permission to invest in upgrading the connection switchboards but VNPT has turned down the proposal.
The number of Viettel’s new subscribers has dropped significantly. Currently, the network signs up only between 2,000 and 3,000 subscribers a day, compared with 6,000 a month earlier. It has also received more complaints from subscribers.
“If this problem persists, Viettel will face bankruptcy as it has invested VND2 trillion (US$126.6 million) in the network’s infrastructure,” said Viettel general director Hoang Anh Xuan. The Ministry of Post & Telecoms is likely to host a meeting this week to deal with the situation.
Young People, Youth
Vietnamese
