Politicizing the telecom sector risks increasing costs for consumers

Huawei’s chief EU representative Abraham Liukang

Speaking this afternoon (21 October) at an African Union (AU)-European Union (EU) webinar on the importance of EU-AU co-operation in research, Huawei’s chief EU representative Abraham Liukang warned that politicizing the future development of the telecom sector will only have the effect of pushing up consumer costs. “Basically, 4G and 5G were built around common technology standards. This brought benefits to consumers in terms of both the quality of new technology products that became available and in cost reductions for the end user. This process of advanced digitization has taken place due to global collaboration in research and science.

"The last thing that the world needs now is for de-coupling to arise as new tech solutions are built. The world should be about uniting together to fight issues like COVID-19 and climate change.

"Huawei has a strong history in taking part in EU research projects and we have also rolled out broadband in many rural parts of Africa, including through our innovative Rural Star project.”

Carlos Zorrinho MEP and who is also the joint chairperson of the EU-ACP Joint Parliamentary Assembly said: “The partnership of equals between the EU and Africa is just exactly that.

"There has to be an equal playing pitch in AU-EU relations when it comes to both the free movement of researchers and the free movement of ideas. Civil society in Africa needs to be engaged more by African governments on research issues. Science needs to be about finding solutions to key problems and it cannot be about controlling lives.

"The EU should support a new Wifi for All initiative in Africa.”

Annelisa Primi from the OECD said that “good science anywhere is good science everywhere. Make science, don’t buy it.

"Africa is helping the world to tackle Covid-19. Due to the experience of Ebola, Africa knows the priorities that need to be set in handling this pandemic.”

Moctar Yedaly, head of ICT at the African Union today said: “African governments need to invest in r@d or they will lose out from the benefits of digitization.

"There must be a paradigm shift in thinking by African governments on this investment matter.

"Investing in clean and green technologies is key – if the UN Sustainable Development Goals are to be reached.

"Cybersecurity and data projects are very important as people around the world want to transact business without any danger.”

Declan Kirrane, managing director of ISC Intelligence said: “There is already ground-breaking research going on in Africa.

"The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) astronomy project is a global scientific initiative. African researchers are very strong too in the areas of data and computational sciences.

"Capacity building in Africa must improve if African researchers are to fully benefit from Horizon Europe and there should also be an alignment between Africa and the EU on GDPR and related policy subjects such as the health sector. The European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership is also making strong advances in tackling HIV, AIDS and malaria.”

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