A Zain base station under construction in Chukudum when Gurtong visited the site in March 2012. [Gurtong/ Peter Lokale Nakimangole]
By Peter Lokale Nakimangole
TORIT, 23 May 2012 [Gurtong] – Zain’s South Sudan Managing Director Dr Hakim Dario told Gurtong the official launch of the network will be held on Saturday, 26 May.
The network, however, went live on Friday last week, with the subscriber numbers growing by the day.
The new networks will cover the entire county including Loriyok town situated along the Torit-Lokichoggio highway and the Budi County Headquarters at Chukudum town.
Mobile telephony continues to grow in South Sudan with a number of companies scrambling for the huge unexploited market.
Just last week, mobile telephony operator Vivacell extended operations to most parts of Central Equatoria State.
The South Sudanese Ministry of Telecommunication and Postal Services has engaged mobile telephony operators in the country in talks in a bid to ensure coverage of the entire South Sudan.
However, just recently the Minister of Telecommunication and Postal Services Madut Biar Yel announced the suspension of Zain network in nine counties of Upper Nile State over what he termed “security reasons”.
He said the move was necessitated by the location of the firm’s central operations in Khartoum in neighbouring Sudan.