The failure of extracting TeleYemen from Al-Houthi and the story of Aden Net encryption... Legitimacy scandals in the communications file

A parliamentary report revealed exciting details and resounding scandals about the reasons for the continued failure by the legitimacy for 8 years to withdraw the communications file from the hands of the Houthi militia or to establish a new system in the liberated areas away from its control.

 On Saturday, the House of Representatives published the final report of the Parliamentary Fact-Finding Committee on what has been raised in the sectors of (electricity - oil - telecommunications - financial aspects).

The recommendations and conclusions contained in the committee's report, as well as the responses provided by the government side on the communications file, revealed shocking details and facts of the way the file was managed over the past years and resulted in an abject failure in confronting the Houthi militia's control of this file.

 Perhaps the most important and prominent revelation of the report was related to what happened to the submarine cable (AAE1) that was connected in Aden in 2017, which is one of the most recent submarine cables, and was built upon to establish the Aden International Gate and the “Aden Net” company to provide the liberated areas with 4G service.  It was launched in the middle of 2018.

 After 5 years have passed since the company faltered, a statement by the Minister of Communications in a televised interview in May of last year revealed part of the reasons for this stumbling, as he said that the encryption submarine cable prevented the company from benefiting from it, without providing details of what happened.

These details were finally revealed by the report of the Parliamentary Committee, that the encryption of the cable took place during the era of the former Minister of Communications, Lutfi Bashrif, who summoned engineers from Sana’a to work on it and trained international engineers. After the international engineers traveled, they left Aden, returned to Sana’a, and encrypted the cable and disabled it.

 The report affirms, "This constituted a fatal blow to the Aden Net project, the only company independent of the Houthis' control, to reduce its ambitions within the limits of the available limited capacities in the alternative Aden-Djibouti cable, which operates at half its capacity," explaining that the encrypted submarine cable "has fallen to the control of the putschists."

 In its response to the committee in this case, the ministry indirectly revealed a shocking fact, which is the lack of international recognition to date of the management of the "TeleYemen" company appointed by the legitimacy, and the continuation of dealing with the Houthi administration in Sana'a.

Where she said, the ministry complained about the lack of financial capabilities over the past years "to give legal cases related to TeleYemen, such as: submarine cables and the top domain, to international legal companies specialized in resolving disputes," which clearly indicates what the legitimate company's management suffers in dealing internationally as a legitimate representative of Yemen.  in the contacts file.

 The ministry’s justification for material capabilities was later denied by the committee, and it showed that it was not serious about extracting the communications file from the hands of the Houthi militia, through its dealings with the issue of encryption of the submarine cable. The ministry responded that it had recently managed to contract with a foreign law firm called “Volterra” for $150,000 to follow up on this case.  

 Where he clarified the committee’s comment, that the government’s agreement with the law firm (Volterra) is limited only to “recovering money for the capacities sold,” while the committee stresses that the case must be “recovering and operating the submarine cable (AAE1) whose cost amounted to (58) million.”  dollar".

The ministry's responses to the committee also confirm its lack of intention to confront the Houthi group and to wrest control of the communications file in Yemen in general by imposing the legitimacy of the management of the "TeleYemen" company appointed by it by restoring the encrypted submarine cable.

 Where the ministry indicated that TeleYemen is in the process of studying the technical specifications for the purchase of two international gateways, while continuing to provide internet service for the Aden Net project via the Aden-Djibouti cable, rehabilitating and connecting the Al-Wadea-Sharurah terrestrial cable, and talking about signing interconnection agreements for international communications with Omantel.

المصدر: نيوزيمن