Zimbabwe's international satellite link has been cut off after the national telephone company failed to pay a $710 000 (about R5,4-million) debt in a move that experts warn could spell the collapse of the Internet in the country.
The managing director of Tel-One, the country's sole fixed line phone company, told the state-controlled Herald newspaper that the company had been disconnected from the key Intelsat link.
Wellington Makamure said Tel-One had applied to the country's central bank for critically scarce hard currency to pay the fee.
"Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has promised to look positively at our plea," he said.
He added that Tel-One was rerouting Zimbabwe's Internet traffic through other means, resulting in a service slowdown. There are around 500 000 Internet users in the country of 11,6 million people.
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Over the past few weeks Internet speeds have been very slow in Zimbabwe and some websites, especially those based in neighbouring South Africa have been inaccessible.
President Robert Mugabe's government tightly controls Internet use and almost all Internet traffic is forced to pass through Tel-One.
Zimbabwe Online, one of the country's major Internet service providers, said in a statement this week that the cutting-off of the international satellite link was causing a near-complete collapse of the Internet in Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe is in its sixth year of economic recession, marked by inflation of more than 1 200 percent, acute shortages of foreign currency, fuel and medicines, as well as spiralling poverty and social hardships.-Sapa-dpa
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This article was originally published on page 11 of Pretoria News on September 21, 2006
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