Airtel reiterates its commitment to Gabon

Senior Executives from Airtel Africa paid a courtesy visit over the weekend to Gabon’s Minister for Telecommunications, along with the President of ARCEP (Gabon’s Regulatory Body).

The visit coincided with the New York Forum, which began on Friday 14 June, to discuss possible areas of synergy with the Gabon Emergent program and reinforce the company’s long term commitment to Gabon.

Present at the meeting were Manoj Kholi, Managing Director & CEO International Airtel, Tiemoko Coulibaly, CEO Africa Francophone and Antoine Pamboro, the Managing Director for Airtel in Gabon.

Kholi said during the meeting, “Airtel is committed to Gabon and ready to work with the Government towards achieving their global ICT goals, working towards making Gabon the ‘Singapore of Africa’. The company is pleased with the quality of collaboration with the Government and would like to thank the Minister and Regulator for their continued effort to create a favorable investment environment in Gabon.”

Gabon aims to have a countrywide digital infrastructure by 2016, thus enabling the development of a wide range of e-services, which will give rise to a major qualitative improvement in social services and create the foundations for Gabon. Several programmes have seen the light of day thanks to this reform policy, including the National Agency of Digital infrastructures and Frequencies and the Digital Economy Development Fund.

The New York Forum AFRICA, is being held in Libreville, Gabon; under the Patronage of H.E. President Ali Bongo Ondimba of Gabon, in collaboration with the government of Gabon. The inaugural New York Forum Africa was about recognizing Africa’s economic achievements and understanding the opportunities for business and investors.

The New York Forum Africa 2013 will focus on the hard work necessary to make these opportunities a reality. The over 600 business and political leaders that gather in Libreville will engage in collaborative sessions to draw up a road map – for individual businesses as well as national policy makers – as a guide and spur to action.

Several Heads of State from the CEMAC region (which is the Economic Community of Central African States), are expected to attend the Forum.

Staff Writer