304 Mediated Publics
Construction zone: Building a national ICT infrastructure
According to government literature and speeches, Morocco’s shift to an
information society is targeted for completion in the year 2010. Whether
or not Morocco will hit its 2010 target of ten million “Internauts” is
uncertain.^14 It is clear, however, that the government has aggressively
pursued the development of a durable ICT infrastructure through mul-
tiple platforms. Legislative reforms and the establishment of a regulatory
agency have been key components of the national strategy. In 1997, after
several years of debate, the landmark Post Office and Telecommunications
Act (Law 24–96) was passed, effectively creating a legal framework for
the liberalization and market growth of the telecommunications indus-
try.^15 Under the Act, the nation’s impressive 100 percent digital net-
work will continue to be improved. The Act also mandated the creation
of a regulatory agency, the Agence Nationale de Règlementation des
Télécommunications (ANRT), which opened in March 1998. The Post
and Telecommunications ministry was also restructured, creating the
Secrétariat de la Poste des Télécommunications et des Technologies de
l’Information (SEPTI).
e Moroccan government’s intensive campaign to liberalize the Th
telecommunications sector has meant transforming the previously state-
run monopoly on communication utilities into a privatized competitive
marketplace. In the mid-summer of 1999, hard work and fraught debate
culminated in legislative change that brought Morocco its first success-
ful licensing tender. Netting $1.1 billion,^16 the sale of a GSM^17 operating
license to the private consortium MediTelecom (Meditel) represented the
most lucrative award for a GSM license ever in a developing nation. The
success of the tender was indicated not only by the final bidding price
but also by the transparent character of the selection process itself.^18 As a
multinational group, Meditel’s receipt of the license was also an important
signal to Moroccans regarding the nation-state’s intentions to participate
in a global economic framework on the road to privatization.
n 2000, the telecommunications industry in Morocco pushed fur-I
ther into the domain of privatization by selling 35 percent of the nation-
ally held phone utility company. The sale of shares to Vivendi Universal
netted the government over $2.3 billion. Renamed Maroc Telecom, the