The Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) has acknowledged the public outcry regarding the deteriorating quality of the telecommunications services inUganda.

The Executive Director of UCC, Godfrey Mutabaazi says that recently UCC published a quality of service report for the period October –December 2011, the results of which indicated poor performance by many of the service providers with respect to dropped and blocked calls.

Mutabazi says that the public is informed that UCC in execution of its regulatory oversight has always engaged service providers to improve their networks so as to meet the minimum standards of quality of service in compliance with their licence obligation.

 In a view of the continued unsatisfactory standards in meeting their network quality, the commission has therefore decided to invoke the provision of the Uganda communication’s act relating to serious and repeated breach of the licence conditions, under which continuous provision of poor quality of service by service providers who don’t meet minimum standard set by the UCC in the provision in the provision of mobile voice telephony is penalised.

The commission has developed penalties schedule and after due consultations with stakeholders, it shall be gazetted for implementation. Mutabazi says the commission shall convene a public stakeholders dialogue to discuss the status of the quality of the telecommunications service in the near future. The leading telecommunication companies inUgandaare MTN Uganda, Uganda TelecomUganda, Orange telecomUganda, and Warid telecomUgandaamong others.