Regulation

Chad tells operators to connect to its national fibre backbone

Chad tells operators to connect to its national fibre backbone

The government of Chad late last week ordered mobile operators Airtel and Moov Africa to connect to its national fibre-optic backbone within seven days or face potential sanctions, after the Telecommunications Minister Boukar Michel met executives from both operators on Wednesday.

The government’s frustration appears in part to relate it an estimated 1,275 kilometres of fibre it is said to have rolled out under its Communications Infrastructure Modernisation and Improvement Project (PMICE) to boost network reliability.

Public expectations for better communication are said to be rising as a consequence, and yet there are still consumer complaints over outages, unstable internet and low service quality – despite high tariffs. There is also far from universal coverage. The ITU estimates 2024 penetration at 86.9% for 2G, 84.5% for 3G and 60% for 4G. There is no 5G service in the country at present.

According to the Connecting Africa news service, internet penetration is about 13.2%, translating to about 2.74 million internet users in January 2025 out of a population of 20.7 million.

Bad QoS is not a new concern in Chad. We reported in August 2023 that the government had fined operator Airtel for failing to meet quality of service requirements. This followed an audit caried out after the regulator and local operators signed an MoU in 2021 and Airtel and Moov agreed to invest heavily in network development over three years.

Recent regulator dissatisfaction with QoS in sub-Saharan Africa has not just been restricted to Chad; fines for bad QoS have also made headlines in Zambia, Togo and Guinea.



More Articles you may be Interested in...