• Starlink has been given the go-ahead to operate in Zimbabwe by its president, Emerson Mnangagwa.
• A report alleges that Mnangagwa side-stepped regulatory approval to launch Starlink in the country.
• The company that will be Starlink’s “sole and exclusive” partner in Zimbabwe is owned by one of Mnangagwa’s close friends.

There are now eight African nations that offer Starlink to customers as Zimbabwe’s President Emerson Mnangagwa fast-tracked a deal that sees the Elon Musk-owned satellite internet provider launch in the country via IMC Communications.

IMC Communications is a local Zimbabwean company owned by Wicknell Chivayo. Several publications have reported that the country’s telecom regulator the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (POTRAZ) has licensed Starlink to operate in Zimbabwe, as per Mnangagwa’s announcement.

“I’m pleased to announce that I have approved the licensing of Starlink by POTRAZ to provide advanced internet and related digital processing services in Zimbabwe through its sole and exclusive partner, IMC Communications (Pvt) Ltd,” wrote Mnangagwa on X.

A report from The Zimbabwean alleges that this claim is untrue, and in fact, POTRAZ is still deliberating on licensing Starlink in the Southern African nation. Not only that, but sources within POTRAZ expressed surprise to the publication that the president made the announcement without receiving the go-ahead from the regulator.

“We at POTRAZ are still deliberating on Starlink,” a source told The Zimbabwean, adding that the application for Starlink to enter the country was “highly technical and requires meticulous analysis.”

“We need to be confident that Starlink has given us all the key information and data before we can make a decision. That is why it is taking long to make a decision,” another source at POTRAZ said.

POTRAZ is now apparently concerned that the approval for Starlink to launch in the country was given via social media, while it should have gone through all the formal processes before licensing and launching.

In a South African context, this would have been like if President Cyril Ramaphosa had side-stepped ICASA’s many regulatory policies and approved Starlink to operate locally. Also, if Ramaphosa had made one of his companies Starlink’s “sole and exclusive” partner as it is alleged that Wicknell Chivayo is a close friend of Mnangagwa.

According to TechZim, Chivayo’s company, IMC Communication, doesn’t even have a functional website yet was awarded the Starlink partnership without any formal processes.

“There is a lot more on this website to suggest that it was hurriedly constructed to be up in time for today’s announcement,” the publication writes. Adding that some links are broken, and others lead to placeholder text. Clicking on ‘broadband’ or ‘satellite tv’ leads you to the generic ‘Hello WPHix’ page.

We checked the website out, and it looks like a generic template, purported to be from a firm called “Etudes Architecture” which is a placeholder name. We also can’t find any offers to subscribe to Starlink at all.

TechZim says that IMC is offering the Starlink kit for $650 (US), and there are three tiers of subscriptions: $38 a month for 50Mbps, $45 for 100Mbps and $85 for 1000Mbps.

A World Bank report from 2021 suggests that only around 35 percent of Zimbabweans have access to the internet, so hopefully the availability of Starlink kits will aid those even in the most rural areas, despite the dodgy situation around its launch.

[Image – Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva on Unsplash]