OT: zimbabwe shut off for non-payment

[Jim Holland]

On Tue, 19 Sep 2006, Ken A wrote:

> I read on another list that Zimbabwe's backbone provider (the gov't) was
> shut off for non-payment by Intelsat. Jim Holland, is Zimbabwe's
> non-profit email provider & MailScanner user, still up and running?

Yes we still are, thanks.  We have not been affected noticeably because
our upstream provider in Zimbabwe uses a second international gateway
which has a SkyVision satellite link which we have preferential access to
(so we are still able to utilise our 64k link to the absolute maximum :-)
Some of the larger ISPs that fully rely on the backbone provider have been
hit badly however.

The govt-owned telecomms service provider (TelOne) does in fact have a
number of other international links (via the UK, Europe, Canada and South
Africa), so the loss of the IntelSat/GlobalConnex link is not a complete
catastrophe.  Just very embarrassing to the regime - which explains why
they admitted nothing for the first three weeks beyond the fact that they
were experiencing "challenges" in bandwidth provision for the country.
Then they finally told us (see http://www.zispa.org.zw) that they were
having problems with an outstanding payment of USD 700,000.  They have
asked the Reserve Bank for the foreign exchange but there is none
forthcoming (there are more important items for the country to pay for
such as the recent purchase of Chinese fighter jets and, of course, this
year's fleet of Mercedes Benzes and SUVs for the elite amongst the
politicians, army and police).

It is another indication of the way this country is gradually crumbling -
perhaps "being crumbled" would be a more appropriate expression, as there
is nothing natural about the process, and we do feel like a loaf of bread
that is being gradually torn apart.  Every new policy announcement simply
indicates another step being taken to drive the country ever downward, and
no amount of blaming of "illegal western sanctions" will ever convince the
people that it isn't all the fault of the regime itself.

Enough of this politics however - as long as we have MailScanner, there is 
still hope :-)

Regards

Jim Holland
System Administrator
MANGO - Zimbabwe's non-profit e-mail service