Diplomats sensitized on radio frequency allocation

An information and awareness-building seminar held yesterday in Yaounde co-chaired by the Ministers in charge of External Relations and of Posts and Telecommunications.

Members of the diplomatic corps and heads of international organisations in Cameroon have been updated with information related to modalities for assigning radio frequencies. The one-day information and awareness-raising seminar that held yesterday December 17, 2015 in Yaounde, was co-presided at by the Minister of External Relations, Lejeune Mbella Mbella and Minette Libom Li Likeng of Posts and Telecommunications on instructions of the President of the Republic, Paul Biya.

The frequency spectrum which comprises all radio frequencies ranging from 8.3 Kilohertz (Kz) to 3,000 Gigahertz (GHz), available for use according to the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications, is a limited resource, hence the institution of frequency management by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). Its management is intended to ensure the non-interfering use of radio frequencies; hence legal instruments have been put in place to regulate the sector. Yesterday’s seminar was therefore to enable diplomatic missions and international organisations to have a clearer picture of Cameroonian regulation as concerns the allocation of frequencies, the constitution of application files, procedures as well as the rights and obligations of the various parties.

To External Relations Minister, government’s determination to accompany diplomatic missions and international organisations in accomplishing their exalting task by providing the necessary facilities such as radio frequencies and other telecommunications infrastructure falls in line with the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. The seminar, Mbella Mbella stressed, will enable diplomatic missions better understand the modalities to follow.

He noted that the objective of the get-together was to gather inputs of participants in view of drawing up a blueprint document that will spell out the different rights and obligations of actors in the allocation of radio electric frequencies. The presence of the General Manager of the Telecommunications Regulatory Board, Jean-Louis Beh Mengue and the Apostolic Nuncio to Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea, His Lordship Piero Pioppo who is also the Dean of the diplomatic corps in Cameroon lent credence on the importance of the seminar.