Vietnamese Gov. to Divide Post and Telcom

Vietnam will scrap its state monopoly on telecommunications, allowing new companies to take 25 percent to 30 percent of the market by 2005, a senior official said Tuesday. The government’s Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Corp. (VNPT) currently holds a monopoly in the lucrative telecommunications sector. Mai Liem Truc, general director of the Department General of Post and Telecommunications, said the government will divide VNPT next year into a postal service and several telecommunications companies, including a telephone corporation and a mobile phone corporation. Those corporations, plus new private companies that enter the market, will have to contribute some of their profits to a national fund that will be used to subsidize the loss-making postal corporation, he said. Currently, VNPT’s telecommunications operations subsidize its postal service. Under a plan approved by the government in October, Vietnam is expected to need dlrs 4 billion to dlrs 6 billion in investment over the next 10 years for development of post and telecommunications, and another dlrs 5 billion to dlrs 6 billion over the following 10 years.
Associated Press