A proposal to rename the Convergence Bill as the Electronic Communications Bill and the resignations of two senior Department of Communications deputy director-generals were announced in Parliament yesterday.
It also emerged yesterday that the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications has not voted to accept the Convergence Bill and has deferred this until it sees the closely related ICASA (Independent Communications Authority of SA) Bill.
Department of Communications director-general Lyndall Shlope-Mafole announced towards the end of yesterday`s deliberations by the portfolio committee that two of her senior deputy director-generals, Joe Mjwara and Phumelele Ntombela-Nzimande, had tendered their resignations.
The policy people
Mjwara was deputy director-general for policy and was the department`s point man with the committee on the Convergence Bill for the past six months following the resignation of his predecessor Pakamile Pongwana, who moved to cellular network operator Vodacom.
Mjwara, 43, told ITWeb he has not decided on his future employment, "but I am looking forward to a long holiday".
He said the Convergence Bill is almost complete apart from a few grey areas and it would prove to be one of the most effective pieces of legislation to be passed by Parliament.
"All interested parties, government, the committee and industry have worked well together."
Mjwara first served as an advisor to former minister of communications Jay Naidoo before joining the department full time to set up its broadcasting unit. He previously worked in the private sector and at the SABC.
He had initially planned to stay with the department for another two years, he said, but had asked to be let go early. However, he did not give any specific reasons.
Moving on
Nzimande will assume a position with the SABC in its department of regulatory and public affairs.
She said the reason for leaving is to move into a more operational position that would include policy implementation.
"The department is primarily a policy development organisation, while an organisation such as the SABC is far more hands-on stuff," she said.
Nzimande, 44, a former political lecturer at the University of Natal, served the department for six years, first as postal regulator and recently as deputy director-general for strategic policy co-ordination, integration and international affairs.
'Something that happens`
Dene Smuts, Democratic Alliance MP on the portfolio committee, said the proposed name change for the Convergence Bill was to bring the title more in line with what the draft legislation aims to do.
"Convergence is something that happens. One can`t legislate it," she said.
Smuts said the legislation was far better than any other drafts and that it could free up far more of the telecommunications sector than previously envisaged.
Mjwara said consensus had been reached on almost every aspect of the Bill and that the name change is not that important.
"What is important is that it speeds up the process for licence applications, it frees up industry to do a number of things, and it sets out clearly what the various licence classes are," he said.
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