On January 21st [es] the Peruvian government, through the Minister of Transportation and Communication (MTC), Carlos Paredes, announced [es] the renewal of the expired cellular phone contracts with Telefónica of Peru (TdP) for a period of 18 years and 10 months. The contracts were for GSM frequency bands of 800 and 1,900 megahertz for Lima and Callao, and for a band of 800 megahertz for the rest of the country, which expired throughout 2011 and 2012. The government has pointed out [es] that they have “been able to triple the benefits of the negotiation”, with new investments and agreements which Peru demanded of Telefónica with a value of 1.184 billion USD (3.02 billion Nuevo Sols), and that a big part of this investment will be for rural areas, which are not profitable. At this link [es] you can see the terms and conditions proposed by the MTC and accepted by Telefónica of Peru. As for the company, it noted in a statement [es] that “Telefónica finally accepts what is demanded by the MTC in spite of the harsh, unprecedented conditions”. Protest against Telefónica in Arequipa. Photo from the blog Sin Patrones. Nevertheless, not everyone is happy. While in the Congress you hear the minister receiving requests for discussion [es] about this “shameful and illegal decision”, associations like CONACUP (National Council of Consumer and User Organizations of Peru) declare [es] that the renegotiation process has not been as transparent as it could have been, and that there should have been an open international public bidding with which perhaps even better conditions would have been obtained. The DN Consultores blog lists [es] various points with which they do not agree: ¿Cómo podemos sentirnos los peruanos ante tal anuncio? ¿Impresionados? ¿Sorprendidos? ¿Algún peruano bien informado podría, incluso, quizás sentirse algo ofendido en su inteligencia? En cualquier caso, poco probable que exista razones para sentirnos reconfortados, por las siguientes razones: - Los términos del acuerdo exacerban la evidente concentración en el mercado de telecomunicaciones; – Derivado de lo anterior, el acuerdo trae abajo la potencia del modelo de la red dorsal como vehículo para impulsar firmemente la banda ancha en el país; y, – La cifra de 3 mil millones es difícil y onerosa de controlar por el Estado Peruano (o sea, genera un uso de recursos innecesario, que nos cuesta a todos los peruanos que pagamos impuestos) ¿How should we, as Peruvians, feel about such an announcement? Impressed? Surprised? ¿Could a well-informed Peruvian maybe even feel their intelligence being somewhat offended? No matter what, it is unlikely that there are reasons to feel comforted, for the following reasons: - The terms of the agreement exacerbate the clear concentration in the telecommunications market; – Coming from the reason above, the agreement lessens the power of the backbone model as a vehicle for firmly propelling broadband in the country; and, – The figure of 3 billion is difficult and burdensome for the Peruvian State to control (that is, it generates a use of unnecessary resources that costs all of us Peruvians who pay taxes) On the website of Gato Encerrado, which had been reporting [es] on the meetings of César Alierta, the president of Telefónica, with President Ollanta Humala, while the limit of state taxes on Telefónica of 2.3 million Nuevo Sols is still in judicial dispute, writes the following: [es] El ministro de Transportes y Comunicaciones, Carlos Paredes, tiró al tacho el informe de Osiptel que valorizó los tres contratos en US$830 millones y en vez de pedir esa cantidad de dinero a Telefónica, se conformó con compromisos de inversión y otros que asumirá la empresa española para renovarles la concesión por 18 años y diez meses. The Minister of Transportation and Communication, Carlos Paredes, threw out Osiptel's report which valued the three contracts at 830 million USD and instead of asking for that amount of money from Telefónica, he accepted investment and other types of agreements that the Spanish company will take on to renew their authorization for 18 years and ten months. Pablo Secada, on the Peruvian Institute of Economy's blog in the newspaper Gestión, believes [es] that the contract renewal is a good thing, even though there are some things that are worth discussing: Entendemos que el paradigma de algunos operadores privados para celular es la tarifa plana nacional para voz e Internet y que algunos operadores globales están ofreciendo tarifa plana mundial. Se nos debe haber pasado leer tal meta en la “lista de logros” de la nota de prensa. Un buen ambiente competitivo casi siempre ofrecerá mejores resultados para los usuarios que cualquier negociación privada del Estado.