Morocco extends fixed phone licences deadline

Morocco has extended by a month offers for a new generation of fixed-line phone licences at the request of bidders, telecoms watchdog ANRT said on Wednesday. Firms can now bid until June 20, instead of May 24 originally, an ANRT spokeswoman said. There are up to six local loops, two long-distance licences and two international ones up for grabs. If successful, the tender will end the monopoly of leading telecoms operator Maroc Telecom, controlled by France's Vivendi Universal.
Since the launch of the tender in February, 31 local and foreign firms have shown an interest.
Fixed-line phone services in Morocco offer high growth potential due to a low penetration rate of less than 5.0 percent of the 30-million-strong population, analysts say. Rabat hopes the fixed-line sector liberalisation will mirror the rapid growth in the number of mobile phone users after the sale in 1999 of a licence to Meditelecom, a consortium led by Spain's Telefonica.