Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan has called for state-owned TTCL (Tanzania Telecommunication Corporation) to reconsider its future as an operator given its failure in the telecoms space.

Local outlet The Citizen quoted Suluhu as saying: “Frankly speaking, TTCL has failed in the telecom business, let them focus on providing broadband; in fact, if they engage in telecom and the broadband belongs to them, there is no fairness in the competition.”

The castigating verdict came after Suluhu received an annual report from the Controller and Auditor General. In her address at State House, Dar es Salaam, Suluhu said that TTCL must review its operations to determine if it can compete effectively in the telecoms market, and identify other areas of operation if not, adding: “I gave this directive last year; I do not know why it has not been implemented.”

TTCL was tasked with registering 100,000 net new subscriptions in the Dar es Salaam region during a review period, but by the end of 2022 it had accrued just 42,000 fixed broadband subscriptions. CommsUpdate noted that its share of the mobile market at this time was just 2.3%, with subscriptions actually falling year-on-year from 1.74 million to 1.42 million.