Telecom Chief Says Rivals Pay Taliban Protection

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Financial Times
June 10, 2008 By Jon Boone, Kabul
Mobile phone companies in Afghanistan are bowing to criminal and Taliban demands to pay protection money to avoid the destruction of their transmission masts, the chief executive of one of Afghanistan’s leading telecommunications companies has claimed.
The Afghan network is already under attack from Taliban fighters who have damaged scores of phone masts in the south that they believe are being used by international forces to detect the positions of fighters.
However, criminals have also started targeting phone masts to extort money, according to Karim Khoja, head of Roshan, an Aga Khan-backed phone enterprise that has over the past five years grown into one of the country’s biggest companies. Mr Khoja believes his company has been disproportionately targeted. Of the 10 masts the Ministry of Communications said had been destroyed this year, eight belonged to Roshan.
“Two years ago our people in the south rarely got threatened because we were really the only service provider,” Mr Khoja said. “But once our competitors came to the south the number of attacks on Roshan, in terms of being threatened and asked for money, went up.
“I believe the competition is paying money, but we don’t do that.”
The claim has been denied by rival companies. Afghan Wireless, Etisalat and Afghan Telecom denied making payments related to threats. MTN, the South African based multinational phone company, was not available for comment.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Communications, which owns Afghan Telecom, said he did not believe the industry was paying protection money.
Amin Ramin, managing director of Afghan Wireless, said most threats to his companies masts “are probably criminals, not Taliban”.
He added: “We do not pay bribes to anyone. Our protection comes because we go into villages not just to make money, but to help the community by building schools and clinics, and hiring local guards.”
Mobile networks are a vital part of daily life for the country’s 5m subscribers. On May 14 the phones of Roshan subscribers in Kabul stopped working when one of the company’s masts in nearby Wardak province was attacked. Such sites are crucial for relaying data from other nearby masts because the country lacks a fibre optic network. Two nearby masts from MTN and Afghan Wireless were not attacked.
Earlier this year Taliban commanders in Wardak’s Saidabad district sent letters to mobile phone companies demanding “financial support” in return for operating in areas in effect controlled by the Taliban.
When the Financial Times called the number on the letter a local Taliban official said two companies had responded to their demands, which he said was just the cost of doing business there. “When a company sets up they have to pay tax to the government of Afghanistan,” he said. “We are the government here and they must pay tax to us.”
The Taliban also ordered companies in the south to turn off their masts between 5pm and 7am. Since then 10 masts had been attacked, the Ministry of Communications said. But complaints by Afghans have led the Taliban to relax their demands to a 7pm shut-down time.
Phone companies have refused to discuss their response to the demands, but Mr Khoja said Roshan had shut seven of its sites. He added: “I will never put the lives of our staff at risk.”
Saeed al-Hamli, chief executive of Etisalat Afghanistan, said the government had not done enough to help. He said: “We are not a political entity and we are not allowed to speak to the Taliban. We need a mediator and that should be the state.”
 
Back
Top