Reporter – Corporate fight brewing over ownership of telecom towers

Original Story

http://www.reporter.bz/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=2596

By Adolph Lucas Jr. – Staff Reporter

A corporate fight is brewing between powerhouse Telemedia Ltd. and Southern Cable Net investor Mike Duncker over eighteen steel towers once owned by Intelco.

Cable Investor Mike Duncker claims that he bought the land with the towers from the DFC at auction. But Telemedia, the telephone giant, insist that the towers belong to them.

Darren Duncker told the Reporter that the row over the tower occurred on Monday 11 February over the 240 foot steel tower located at Mile 8. Eight employees of Telemedia were in the process of taking down the tower, piece by piece. The police stepped in to stop .

“The tower and the land were bought at a DFC auction last year.” Dunker said. The title papers prove that Mike Dunker owns them.

On Tuesday, February 12 at La Democracia, where there is another tower we saw armed BDF ean and two KBH men – one of which was also armed,” Darren Duncker told Reporter.

The Dunckers’ had to call in the police again and the BDF and KBH guards were removed because Duncker was able to show proof that he had bought the land and all of the erections thereon.

The dispute continued on Thursday 14 February, Valentine’s Day. The Dunckers had placed locks on the building. They claim that BTL had sent men to break these locks and install their own locks.

Hezron Cadle, a director of Southern Cable Net Ltd told the Reporter, “B.T.L has no right to enter those premises. We own all the Intelco Towers.”

The tower at Mile 8 is a part of a network of 18 towers formerly owned by Intelco.

Duncker bought the land and the erections at a public auction authorized by the Development Finance Corporaton. Southern Cable Net Limited has plans to do what -20Intelco tried to do and failed. Southern Cable wants the network of towers for a networ of cellularl phones it intend to introduce.

According to Cadle, Southern Cable Net has a system which is far superior to B.T.L’s system. The company plans to introduce a telephone network using voice over Internet protocol or VOIP. It plans to take on BTL in head-on competition.

The Reporter has made several attempts to contact Telemedia’s Manager of Marketing and Sales, Mrs. Karen Bevans for comments, but was unable to reach her.

Reporter – Barrow’s Cabinet takes Oath of Office

Original Story:

http://www.reporter.bz/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=2580&Itemid=2

By Niall Gillett – News Editor

Governor General Sir Colville Young swars in the new Cabinet comprised of 12 Ministers and five assistants at his residence in Belmopan.

The 16 chosen Ministers and Ministers of State of the new United Democratic Party Government were sworn in today, Tuesday February 12, at the residence of the Governor General in the Capital City, Belmopan.

Crammed into the small welcoming room with their families, friends and the media, they officially took on the tasks of their portfolios with a signature and a handshake from the Governor General, Sir Colville Young.

They walked down the curved driveway to be reunited with and to be greeted by crowds of their supporters, waiting to congratulate them. That afternoon, the leaders of the new government met in the Cabinet Room to begin the first official business of the day.

The programme started at about 10:15 AM with the entrance of the Governor General, Sir Colville Young. He noted that although it is not a big priority on the Government’s list, the tightly packed room needed to be made bigger.

For expediency, he asked that all swear the Oath together, rather than one at a time, and then invited each member individually to sit at the table for the signing.

After the signatures were all complete, Prime Minister Dean Barrow, who was sworn in last Friday, addressed the Governor General and thanked him, reaffirming his pledge to have his Government conduct itself in an open, fair and transparent manner.

In an interview with Prime Minister Barrow after the ceremony, he told the Reporter that he and the members of Cabinet would start their first meeting discussing the various Rules and Articles of Conduct of the Cabinet.

He said it was important for the members to treat not only their fellow colleagues with mutual respect, but also the members of the Public Service. He said that they would also have an overview of Belize’s financial situation to presented by the Financial Secretary, Joseph Waight, a leftover from the previous government.

He said his administration would attempt to set a date for the inaugural First sitting of the National Assembly.

Asked about the promise for lower fuel costs, Prime Minister Barrow responded that it was his government’s plan to do away with the current Revenue Replacement Duty.

RRD on fuel, and replace it with fairer, flat tax.

He explained that this could be done in the first 90 days of the new government, provided that all legal requirements to make the changes are met.

He confirmed his pledge – to empower the Public Utilities Commision (PUC), and make changes to the currently restricted use of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) technology in Belize.

Finally Prime Minister Barrow repeated his promise to keep the public informed about decisions made by his government, and to improve relations with the media.

Prime Minister Barrow said that he had originally conceived of four Ministers of State, but after Michael Hutchinson had done what he did in defeating the PUP incumbent, Ralph Fonseca, he promptly revised his plan and appointed him to be a Minister of State.

Hutchinson will serve as Minister of State in the Ministry of Local Government, which is headed by Minister Garbriel Martinez.

BTL – VoIP Blocking Pride

At the June 2007 CANTO confernce, BTL made it very clear that they are blocking VoIP. They have proudly become the model for other Caribbean telecommunications companies to emulate. The arrogrance is so breathtaking, they even invited their VoIP blocking vendor (Bitek) to present. If you are interested in learning more about the “economic protections” employed by BTL, head over the CANTO website – www.canto.org – the presentations from the conference are linked from the bottom of the home page. Here are some highlights:

BTL CHAIRMAN OPENING STATEMENT 2007

Bitek International – Managing VoIP.pdf

Bitek International – VoIP Filtering.pdf

Bitek International – Reversing Revenue Decline.pdf

This takes the cake… click on the picture to see BTL’s certificate of arrogance:

Amandala – BTL Censors Krem Radio

If you didn’t think Mikey Ashcrook was going to use his power to censor Belizean speech… now you have it. Evan Hyde responds.

Original Story:

http://www.amandala.com.bz/index.php?id=5696

Posted: 29/05/2007 – 01:18 PM
Author: Evan X Hyde

There’s been another attack made on KREM Radio by Michael Ashcroft’s Belize Telecommunications Limited. They’ve taken KREM off the Internet. Apart from denying Belizeans in the United States (and other parts of the world) the opportunity to hear Belize’s most popular radio station, BTL has taken out our Punta Gorda, Placencia, Independence, and Corozal Town connections, which work through the Internet.

Ashcroft’s attack is in retaliation for the Mose Hyde/Kalilah Enriquez campaign against the $33 million UHS motion, because it was his Belize Bank which would have benefited. KREM was taken off the Internet at 12 noon on Friday, right after the PUP Albert and Lake Independence representatives, Mark Espat and Cordel Hyde, abstained in the House of Representatives when the controversial Ashcroft Bill to convert BTL into Belize Telemedia Limited came up for a vote.

In the battle being waged in the streets and the countryside of Belize between the Ashcroft Supporters Society and the people of Belize, it is KREM Radio which the Englishman considers more dangerous than the newspaper. There are different reasons for this, but I will discuss these reasons another time. Suffice to say that at the book launching a couple months ago for the LOVE FM owner’s literary effort, Lord Ashcroft showed up in the front row, and when questioned about it by Jules Vasquez, responded, “Anything for Rene!”

When Lord Ashcroft launched a legal and financial attack against KREM Radio in late March of this year, a very successful UDP area representative tried to whip up UDP sentiment against myself and KREM Radio in the UDP’s newspaper. This UDP politician has a friendly relationship with the wealthy Lord, and that friendly relationship was on national television for all to see. So I will just leave it at that.

Almost June 2007 – BTL Still Censoring Belizeans.

Since March of 2006, BTL has been selectively deciding what internet content Belizeans can access. This site has chronicled their blatant deceit and suppression of independent choice. The colonial lords and ladies, after being outcast from Britain to Belize, have decided to make our country their own personal experiment in economic shame. BTL is no exception. It is locked in the stranglehold of the “Ashcroft Curse”. Prices go up, Mikey gets richer, and Belize falls even further behind in many of the key social, educational and infrastructure measures as compared to the rest of the world.

Internet (IP) voice and video are now global standards in communication for many industries. Many people have simply circumvented BTL’s blocks, and some have gone so far as canceling BTL in favor of an alternate ISP. It has been some time since this site was updated. We believe it is time for a reminder on how exactly to circumvent BTL and get what the constitution affords you despite the criminal actions of Lord Ashcrook:

• If you simply want to dump BTL, your options are SMART/SpeedNet or satellite. The satellite options are still DirecWay, Starband and now iDirect. We may cover these options as they pertain to VoIP usage in further posts. The goal for this post is to update residents of Belize on bypassing BTL’s VoIP blocks on their high-speed DSL internet services.
• If you use Skype or any other PC-based telephony service, the answer is a software VPN (virtual private network). Most people have used HotspotVPN and Witopia SecureMyWiFi. For technical technical reasons beyond the scope of this post, it is always better to opt for a “UDP-based” VPN. AnchoFree is another variety of VPN that is FREE, but quality has varied greatly with AF expecially on 128kbps connections (BTL’s $100bz/mo ADSL service).
• If you use Vonage or Packet8 or any other SIP adapter-based product, there are two options. The first is to turn your PC, running the PC-based VPN software, into a “router/encrypt-er” for your Vonage box. Many of the country’s IT professional have been quietly implementing this service for their customers. Ask around and you will likely find a technician willing to help you set this up.
• The second option for Vonage users to purchase a dedicated VPN router, a hardware based solution. This alleviates the need for a PC to run the VPN and generally results in a much more stable and clear connection for the voice/video call. This option requires a service provider in the US or any country outside Belize to provide a VPN server to which your hardware can connect.
• The last option is to find a service provider either PC-based or adapater-based that uses the IAX protocol. IAX is a protocol developed along with the open source PBX named Asterisk and is currently NOT blocked in Belize. IAX is a less common IP voice protocol to its big brother SIP, but it works just the same. Future posts will include direct links to IAX service providers and IAX hardware.

The goal of this site is to protect the rights of the residents of Belize. We’re not interested in bowing to BTL’s intimidation. Some comments on this site in the past have suggested that these solutions should be kept quiet. We respect that opinion, but we must also respectfully disagree. BTL is acting criminally. BTL is a piece of a massive criminal scheme to make a few rich British Lords a bit richer. In their circles, Belizeans are a big JOKE. Why should we curb our mutual disrespect and disdain for their behaviour?

Channel 7 – Caribbean Telecom Companies Meet in Belize

Original Story:

http://www.7newsbelize.com/archive/01290705.html

Executives from the Caribbean’s phone companies are in Belize this week for the annual meeting of CANTO, the Caribbean Association of National Telecom providers. This is CANTO’s 23rd meeting, and in the two decades plus since it was formed, the telecommunications landscape has been completely re-shaped. In Belize alone, the number of telephone subscribers has increased many times over since this country first joined CANTO in 1985. But while there’s been exponential growth, in their remarks at last night’s opening, BTL CEO Dean Boyce and Prime Minister Said Musa, were cautious: they advocated restraint and even protection of BTL; because they say, if it has to compete with Vonage, that could send local rates up, even as international rates go down.

Dean Boyce – BTL’s CEO
“We now face, find ourselves faced by foreign operators delivering voice services in Belize without a network. The VoIP providers are seen by many as the way forward because they offer call rates into the USA for example that are equivalent to domestic rates. They do however create some potentially dangerous repercussions to the local tariff industry and the local industry unless it is carefully managed.

We already use this type of technology and in fact these VoIP providers are using our network to connect their calls. This is economic discussion. The foreign VoIP providers make no contribution at all to the local telecom infrastructure in Belize and the cost of building and maintaining that infrastructure. Instead they simply access Belizean customers over the infrastructure provided by local operators such as BTL.

If BTL is now expected to compete face to face directly with a U.S. service provider on U.S. terms, the Belize telecom industry is now a part of the U.S. telecom industry then we must and will take whatever steps are required to meet that head on. We will have no choice but prioritize our resources, to charge at a rate that will allow us to recover our costs and stop subsidizing access.”

Rt. Hon. Said Musa,
“It is important that Caribbean governments are able to control their own destines and develop according to our own agendas and not to the financial agenda of foreign operators that seek to export the wealth of our countries and to limit our ability to achieve full universal service.”

Both Boyce and PM Musa announced that BTL has applied to the PUC to install a wireless high speed internet platform across the country.

Channel 5 – B.T.L. Hosts CANTO Annual General Meeting

Spreading their greedy protectionist philosophy all around the Caribbean…

Original Story:

http://new.channel5belize.com/archive_detail_story.php?story_id=17864

Taking place in Belize City this week is the annual general meeting of CANTO, the Caribbean Association of National Telecommunications Organizations. Opening ceremonies were held Sunday night at the Radisson, with Prime Minister Said Musa delivering the main address.

Prime Minister Said Musa
“It is important that a body such as CANTO protects or work to protect our local telecommunication industry. It is important that Caribbean sovereign governments are able to control their own destinies and develop according to our own agenda and not to the financial agenda of foreign operators that seek to export the wealth of our countries and to limit our ability to achieve full universal service. We can learn from the world, but in the Caribbean we must be masters of our own destiny. Organisations such as CANTO can insure that Belize and other countries within the region continue our strong historic progress and the strength of our domestic businesses. This bond, this partnership, this unity creates one strong voice resonating throughout the world.”

Canto was founded in 1985 and primarily represented the interests of Cable and Wireless, the region’s dominant telecom provider. Over the years the Organization has expanded its membership, but continues as the regional voice of full service operators, like B.T.L., who must now compete with emerging providers entering the market with wireless and cable T.V. based platforms.

The Internet Service Wars Over Market Share In Cayo West

By Ray Auxillou

Most of this story is arrived at, by information from lower level customer clerks, so one has to take this information with a grain of salt. This is what we can piece together from the three businesses in competition, closely guarding the trade secrets. The internet MARKET SHARE WAR in Cayo West hills and valleys, is over the rapidly expanding growth, to serve roughly 15,000 current existing homes and businesses with internet ISP services. Growth of new homes has been steady over the past five years and government continues to acquire land for new subdivisions and more and more REALTY offices go into business to serve the construction expansion going on, in the beautiful climate of ETERNAL SPRING, found in the highlands of the Cayo West foothills of the Belize Alps. The DFC is making a mint for the Trinidadian Bank that owns past government housing schemes out here in Cayo West. Houses are regularly being foreclosed, resold and re-occupied to the profit of all concerned. There seems no shortage of customers and incoming settlers?

Currently internet services are being supplied by BTL the major telecommunications provider in the country, that inherited the old colonial copper line system of telephone networks back from colonial days and which they decided to no longer maintain and expand. Satellite internet came in about seven years ago for those with big pocket books, which was originally DIRECWAY, but is now provided by a merger and restructuring with newer Satellite technology called the Hughes 7000 system. This internet provider is USA based and since it operates by satellites owned by US companies high in outer space, most middle and lower class Belizeans do not have the credit card facility and mailing address required in the USA to pay for it. Installers mostly come from either Corozal or Spanish Lookout. SMART the newcomer competitor to the telecommunications business out of Orange Walk have a local office in the twin towns and are selling their version of internet service through a cell phone.

The way these competing internet ISP companies for market share currently operate is via radio waves. BTL has the best operating service, with different bandwidth and speeds advertised up to 2 million bps, or DSL, which local consumers regard as excellent, but vastly overpriced. Some would say price gouging, or a ripoff? The reason they have the best service is because of the fiber optic international cable down on the coast, which allows unlimited speeds and bandwidth, as the cable goes under the Caribbean Sea. In a power play nearly ten years old, BTL paid for and acquired ownership of the international fiber optic NAP and because of political campaign donations, the government incumbent party was never able to nationalize this fiber optic access point for the national good. A political compromise that has thwarted and haunted telecommunications ever since, throughout the country of Belize.

Belize North – The Telephone Situation

Original Story:

http://www.belizenorth.com/telephone_situation_2006.htm 

Basically, the situation has not changed much, altho there is a lot of hullabaloo about it.

You can read about the hullabaloo here, a site maintained by the Belize Free Internet Consortium.  As I have pointed out elsewhere, Hon. Said Musa and the PUP acknowledged that the Internet was key to future economic success in 1999.  He commissioned a a blue ribbon panel to study the Services sector of the economy and presented a report which was on the belize.gov website for over five years.  This year, it disappeared. (You can see it here.)   After that repoort was issued, the PUP pressed to quit the monopoly that BTL had.  A competitor, Intelco, was founded to break the monopoly, and was awarded a contract to supply all of the GOB’s communications.  It a farcical series of events, Intelco borrowed a bunch of money (about $88 million) from the DFC and a Miami bank; built a set of towers and offices, and then… shut down, defaulting on the loans. BTL continued to supply GOB communications.  

Speednet is a competitor in the Cellular arena, but they buy all of their services from BTL! 

The history of BTL, through Jun 2005, is related by Mark Espat here.  At that time, it appeared that BTL might be sold to employees and other interested Belizeans, but the majority share was sold back to Lord Michael Ashcroft. It soon became apparent that BTL would not lower its rates — the Belize was still basically in the same monopoly situation it was in when the services report was published in 1999!

Mort recently, the PUC and the Legislator have expressed a desire to allow people in Belize to use VoIP (Voice over Internet) systems to make long distance calls.  This has been thwarted by BTL.  Their blockage of such services as Skyp and Vonage are related here.  

Most recently, BTL has announced a new service, WebTalk which works like other VoIP services. By some accounts, it appears to be antequated and expensive.

My old partner and friend Hugo now has a calling center in Corozal.  His office, Stellar Links, is at 39A 4th Avenue (half a block north of Reyes) and he offers calls to the US for $5 dollah a half hour, $2.50 min. for 15 minutes or less.  You can inquire by mail here.

If you have additional comments about the current situation, please write me.

Channel 5 – B.T.L. Introduces Low Cost “Webtalk” Service

Original Story:

http://www.channel5belize.com/archive_detail_story.php?story_id=17624 

They refuse to let Belizeans take advantage of low cost computer based phone services like Skype or Vonage and for that and other reasons few people will be singing the praises of B.T.L. this Christmas. But as of December fifteenth the phone company is offering an alternative that, while not as economical as we’d like, at least is a whole lot cheaper than we had before. News Five’s Kendra Griffith reports.

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
It’s called the Webtalk and according to Senior Marketing Rep. Lisa Stanford, it’s just one more means by which B.T.L. customers can make cheaper international calls.

Lisa Stanford, Sr. Marketing Rep., B.T.L.
“It’s B.T.L.’s internet phone service and with that service customers could make calls from their PCs to a regular telephone number or a mobile number to destinations over the world. It doesn’t have to be the U.S.; it’s international calls at very low rates.”

And while you might not need a phone, you will need…

Lisa Stanford
“They need to have computer, internet access-–preferably B.T.L.’s high speed internet access-–and they also need to have a headset. We’re recommending that they have a headset that they could have on the ears like you did, we’re recommending a one hundred twenty-eight k high speed internet connection.”

You will also need to have access to an international credit card.

Lisa Stanford
“It’s simple to register, to get on to the web site, and it’s just one two, three steps, and you’re on, and you can make calls.”

Step One, log on to www.webtalk.btl.net

Lisa Stanford
“Once you are here, the first thing you are gonna do as a new customer is register your account. So click on register and fill out your necessary information.”

Step two, Purchase calling time

Lisa Stanford
“We have four denominations, five, ten, twenty, and thirty. They are all U.S. dollars. You click on the one that you want, and it will automatically change here. You don’t have to write that in. Then you put in your information, your credit card number, your security code and everything that’s needed in order to purchase it.”

Step three, download the software.

Lisa Stanford
“Every time you want to use the service, you just need to put in your username and your password and login to the service.”

Step four, place your call.

Lisa Stanford
“With this service you just dial the country code. For the U.S. it’s going to be one and then the area code and then the seven digit number.”

Webtalk also comes with features like a phonebook, call history, and how much money you have remaining. Stanford says another plus is that the service doesn’t tie you down to one computer.

Lisa Stanford
“Once you’ve registered your account, you could use that account while you are travelling abroad, you could use it while you’re at home or at work, it doesn’t have to be stationary, anywhere that you are, and you have access to internet and your credit card, you could use the service. The reviews have been very good, and the service being that it’s voice over IP is very good. So we’re recommending that you know people could come out, they could use it.”

Like its other promotions, calls on Webtalk get cheaper after five minutes, Kendra Griffith reporting for News Five.

For more information on rates or to try the service, log on to www.webtalk.btl.net. As for those other lower cost computer phone services, many Belizeans have discovered that there are ways to electronically beat the system and continue to do so.