Cebu Biz Sector Backs PRRD’s Call for Improved Connectivity

While they recognize the efforts of telecommunication companies to improve connectivity, business leaders in Cebu have welcomed President Rodrigo Duterte’s stern call on the telecommunications industry to improve their service to their subscribers.

The business sector here considered improved internet connectivity as “especially important these days when remote work is widely adapted”.

Wilfredo Sa-a Jr., Cebu IT BPM Organization managing director, said the reliability of telecommunications services is even more vital now as more people work from home and rely on the internet connections for their deliverables.

“The reliability of telco services and Wi-Fi will always be welcomed as work-from-home is getting to be a very popular option,” he told the Philippine News Agency.

He added “the more reliable telcos, the better, and hope this will be accompanied with more globally competitive costing, fast and affordable”.

Sa-a is leading the group of outsourcing companies in Cebu, one of the sectors that are highly dependent on internet connection.

For Mandaue Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Steven Yu, telecommunications companies have done measures to improve their services.

“The telcos are not perfect but I believe that they are also trying their best to improve connectivity. They may have issues on permitting, etc. and we can listen to them,” he said.

During his fifth state of the nation address Monday, President Rodrigo Duterte urged the duopoly of PLDT and Globe Telecom to improve their services by December or face “closure” or “expropriation.”

“Kindly improve the services before December… better have that line cleared… If you are not ready to improve, I might just as well close all of you and we revert back to the line telephone at kukunin ko yan expropriate ko sa gobyerno (and I will take it and expropriate in favor of the government),” Duterte said.

The President said the telecommunications giants should find ways to infuse more capital if money is the problem.

He vowed to spend his last two years in office in improving telecommunications services in the country with the help of Congress.

Globe Telecom, backed by Singapore’s Singtel Group, is a unit of Ayala Corp. while Manny Pangilinan serves as the chairman of PLDT Inc., which is partly owned by Japan’s NTT DoCoMo and HK-based First Pacific Co.

Third telecommunications player DITO Telecommunity is aiming to challenge the duopoly of Globe and PLDT.