Turning on the meter

If you are a Cable & Wireless Internet customer in Seychelles, you can no longer expect to download as much as you like and don’t pay for it.

The company says about 5% of its customers use up to 50% of the bandwidth available.

At the core of this issue is the use of the Internet to download material, which can be text, photos, songs and videos, including full length feature films. Cable & Wireless argues that the use of broadband has increased dramatically as both the number of Internet users and the amount they download have increased.

This situation is not only unsustainable, but threatening to slow down the speed of Internet on the Cable & Wireless network. The solution, the company argues is makes those who use a lot pay more.

Cable & Wireless Internet customers have been informed that they are being placed on different packages according to their customary usages. Besides the basic fee for the package, customers will be charged for additional usage above the allowance in the package.

But this move has raised many protests. Some customers have accused the company of simply using the scheme to increase prices, making them pay more for a service they were getting.

Cable & Wireless says the majority of its customers will not see any increase in their monthly payments if their usage pattern remains the same.

United connect with Airtel

Airtel customers in Seychelles will soon get exclusive access to rich and exclusive Manchester United content on their mobile phones. This follows the signing of a five-year partnership between Bharti Airtel and United.

Bharti Airtel, is Asia's leading telecom services provider and operates in India, Sri Lanka and the Seychelles.

This partnership will give Airtel customers across the Seychelles, India and Sri Lanka the opportunities to participate in training sessions with Manchester United Soccer Schools coaches, to attend matches at Old Trafford and travel into Europe with United to UEFA Champions League games.

The announcement was made at Old Trafford earlier this week by Sanjay Kapoor, Deputy CEO, Bharti Airtel in the presence of United's David Gill (CEO), Richard Arnold (Director of Commercial), Sir Alex Ferguson (Manager) and players Darren Fletcher, Wayne Rooney and Carlos Tevez.

With the English Premiere League and the UEFA Champions League becoming more popular amongst the young population of Seychelles, this partnership will ensure Manchester United popularity locally.

Seychelles far from underwater cable

The Seychelles government says plan to build a fibre-optic link across the Indian Ocean, will depend entirely on the private sector.

Answering a question I put to the Minister for National Development in the National Assembly, on how far his ministry had arrived in the project to install an underwater cable to connect Seychelles with the rest of the world, Mr Jacquelin Dugasse says the government is seriously considering two options.

The first option is to connect with the Lower Indian Ocean Network (LION) at a cost of $30 million and the second is to connect with the ESSAy project from Dar-es-Salaam at the cost of $50-60 million.

As for the financing option, the minister says the cost would have to be met by the private sector. Already a local cable company has been formed to raise funds for the project.

A feasibility study costing $500 thousand, with the African Development Bank footing the lion share is being carried out to decide which of the two options is best for Seychelles.

Although I support this project and appreciate the fact that Seychelles will eventually be well connected to economic hot spots in the Middle East as well as South Africa, India and Europe, I see the danger of the few telecommunication companies we have here monopolising its benefits - which keeps prices high and so out of reach of many.

Currently, Seychelles relies solely on satellite connections for internet and telephone calls.

Whilst Africa has ten cables, Seychelles failed to embrace the technology when it was first introduced in the region several years ago, when it would have cost us merely $3 million.

But the most important question of all - when is expected to be ready? Minister Dugasse simply refused to be taken to task later by the Assembly's Government Assurances Committee.

MCB launched ATM prepaid service

A new service allowing prepaid mobile phone users to refill their credit using the ATM service is now available in Seychelles.

The service is an initiative of the Mauritius Commercial Bank (MCB).

The scheme applies to both Airtel and Cable & Wireless customers who hold an account with the bank. But they can also top up the credit of anyone else they have told the bank about.

To top up or refill their credit, clients have to follow the refill option on MCB-owned ATMs, or SMS or call 1838 on a 24-hour basis.

An MCB spokesperson said the bank’s aim is to increase its product portfolio and diversify its services while at the same time remaining proactive in contributing to the fulfillment of its customers’ demands.

Seychelles joins the pan-African e-network project

Seychelles is the second African country, after Senegal to join the $1 billion pan-African e-network project initiated by the Indian government.

The project aims to develop the continent information and communication technologies. Seychelles is expected to benefit through the tele-medicine programs, e-learning and teleconferencing facility for the head of state.

The first facility to be launched this week at the Ministry of Health headquarters was the tele-medicine network. The system will be used to share knowledge from Indian doctors with their Seychellois counterparts through online training programs and getting second opinion on medial diagnosis.

Victoria hospital will eventually be connected to twelve Indian tele-medicine specialist centres and four from the African continent, including 53 hospitals.


“Tele-medicine presents countless possibilities for the doctors and patients. It will improve the quality of health care, reduce cost and offer educational opportunities,” said Marie-Pierre Lloyd, the Minister responsible for health.

The education network will allow similar information sharing.

The E-network project was first announced by Indian president Abdul Kalam in South Africa in 2004. In October 2005, the Indian government and the Africa Union signed a memorandum of understanding to formalize the project.

Seychelles hosts e-health conference

Health ministers and their counterparts in charged of information and communication technology (ICT) from thirteen East, Central and Southern African countries are meeting in Seychelles to discuss the promotion of e-health on the continent.

The meeting is aimed at promoting the use of information technology in the continent’s health care system to help achieve the millennium goals and to attain the most with the limited financial resources.



“Our nations must forge ahead to develop our systems and processes if we are to ensure a better, improved and sustainable quality of life for our people, with health developments taking centre stage,” Vice-President Joseph Belmont said in the conference’s opening address.

The three day conference is an opportunity for the continent’s health and ICT expert to rethink how best to effect change and improve health service provision for the benefit of both consumers and providers using ICT.

“E-health holds the promise of a more evidence-based, result-oriented and effective health care system,” said Belmont.

The conference organizers said the event will allow governments to improve services for patients and communities, increase access to services and improve the training of health workers, with enormous impact on these processes.

Editors' note: e-health is a relatively recent term for health care practice which is supported by electronic processes and communication. The term is inconsistently used: some would argue it is interchangeable with health care informatics and a sub set of health informatics, while others use it in the narrower sense of health care practice using the Internet. The term can encompass a range of services that are at the edge of medicine/health care and information technology.

The 12th Highway Africa Conference in pictures

With SA's top vlogger on YouTube Khaya Dlanga.



With Highway Africa's Future Journalists Project (FJP) Co-ordinator, Moagisi Lethlaku.

Nature Seychelles wins Highway Africa award

Nature Seychelles, the leading environmental organisation in the country is a winner at this year’s Highway Africa Digital Journalism Award in South Africa.

Speaking in Grahamstown, where he collected the award, Nature Seychelles’ CEO Dr Nirmal Shah said their achievement is proof that local non-governmental organisations (NGO) should go beyond the limitation of small island states.

“The World Wide Web, gives us the prospect to reach the world and for the world to reach us. Get up and use it,” says Shah.

Nature Seychelles was nominated for spearheading environmental conservation through the internet within the Seychelles and across the Western Indian Ocean shelf, using its website http://www.natureseychelles.org.

The organisation came top in the non-profit category, ahead of African Woman and Child Feature Service, a Nairobi-based media organisation.

The award also recognises the NGO’s effort in encouraging other Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to embrace new media technologies for environmental conservation. In addition, Nature Seychelles won for its success in using the youth’s skills and creativity to spread the message of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and the environment on the fragile islands ecosystems within Seychelles.

“The recognition is proof that we are doing a fantastic work in Seychelles. It’s good news for all local conservationists that not everything is doom and gloom, but that we are actually saving birds and involving the children in our effort.”

The Award ceremony is part of the annual Highway Africa conference, the largest annual gathering of African journalists in the world. This rendezvous focuses on debates about journalism and new media.