Speaking during a ceremony to mark the first anniversary of the company's operations in Mozambique, chief executive officer Ramos Sengo said “last May Movitel had invested 117 million US dollars in Mozambique. That figure is now 300 million dollars”.
Other achievements claimed by the company include expanding its fibre optic network from 12,600 kilometres in May last year to 20,000 kilometres this year. In addition, the company now has coverage in all the country’s 128 districts and a national coverage rate of eighty per cent. When the company began its operations its services were only available in 78 districts.
The company currently has a hundred shops compared with just ten a year ago. A further 4,000 sales outlets are dotted around the country.
Ramos Sengo stressed the company’s social contributions, which include providing free internet access to 2,500 schools and donating video-conferencing facilities to the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of the Interior. It has also constructed a communications school for the Ministry of Defence at a cost of 1.5 million dollars.
In addition, this year Movitel donated 200,000 dollars to the victims of the floods that affected the southern Mozambican province of Gaza.
The majority shareholder in Movitel, with 70 per cent, is the Vietnamese company Viettel, which is wholly owned by the Vietnamese Defence Ministry. It is currently the largest provider of mobile phone services in Vietnam, claiming 44 per cent of the market.
Its partner, holding the other 30 per cent of Movitel, is SPI, a holding company for Mozambique’s ruling Frelimo Party.
Some commentators have questioned the reliability of figures released by Movitel. Unlike the other to mobile operators, M-Cel and Vodacom, Movitel has undertaken very little advertising.
Post published in: Africa News