South Africa - Icasa slashes interconnect rates.

South Africa's telecommunications regulator Icasa has proposed sharp reductions in mobile termination rates. Under the three-year glide path, mobile interconnect rates, currently set at ZAR 0.89 per minute, would fall to ZAR 0.65 from July this year, ZAR 0.50 next year and ZAR 0.40 from July 2012. Fixed interconnect rates would drop to ZAR 0.15 from July and further reduce to ZAR 0.10 from July 2012. The mobile operators already lowered their rate to ZAR 0.89 from March, and had proposed further cuts to ZAR 0.85 in October 2011 and ZAR 0.80 in October 2012. However, the regulator rejected the operators' proposal, which also …