The National Legislative Assembly (NLA) has kick-started its process to amend the telecom and frequency-allocation laws in order to pave way for the merger of the independent telecom and broadcasting regulatory bodies.

Yesterday the subcommittee of the assembly's panel on science and information and communications technology held its first hearing.

It proposed that after the merger the regulator's role be limited to regulating the industry and not include, as at present, delivering policies, which should be the job of the government alone.

Anupab Tiralap, who leads the subcommittee drafting team, said that currently the policy-delivery roles of the National Telecommuni-cations Commission (NTC) and the government overlapped.

The subcommittee also proposed the amendment of clauses in the frequency-allocation law relating to the evaluation of the regulator's performance. Anupab said existing clauses did not help consumers demanding accountability from the licensing body's commissioners for unsatisfactory performance.

According to the proposal, the frequency-allocation law should be amended to merge the NTC and the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC).

The NBC is still in the process of formation, a state of affairs which has deterred the NTC from issuing new frequency licences. This in turn has blocked development in telecom services.

The Central Administrative Court ruled in November 2005 to invalidate as unconstitutional the process of selecting 14 candidates for NBC seats. This effectively prevented the granting of licences for new frequencies such as 3G broadband, as the NTC was not empowered to do this alone.

The frequency-allocation law mandates both licensing bodies to jointly manage the telecom and broadcasting spectrums and prescribe utilisation.

The subcommittee proposed that the telecom law should state clearly that the interconnection charge would be applied to all telecom operators, whether private concessionaires of state telecom agencies or the regulator's licensees, and should state clearly that the regulator had authority over the private concessions of the state agencies.

The NTC's existing rule requires all telecom operators to bilaterally share voice and data revenue between signatories to the interconnection-charge deals.

TOT has opposed the use of the interconnection charge by private telecom concessionaires on the grounds that they are not NTC licensees like TOT, according to its interpretation of telecom law.

Some mass-communications scholars at the seminar were quick to oppose the merger of the NTC and NBC, citing concerns that the merged body would focus on development of the larger telecom industry to the detriment of broadcasting.

They said the establishment of a merged and truly neutral NTC and NBC would be a waste of time and further deter the development of the industry as a whole.

Sethaporn Cusripituck, an NTC commissioner, said the frequency-allocation law already made it clear that NTC and NBC had to work together.

The subcommittee will hold a final public hearing on the proposal on March 30 before submitting its conclusions to the science and ICT committee, which will submit the proposals to the Information and Communication Technology Ministry for forwarding to the Cabinet.

Usanee Mongkolporn

The Nation