Government involve GHQ, ISI in 4G & 5G auction committee

• Shehbaz Sharif will chair Friday’s cabinet meeting. Ministry of Information.
• ECC of the Cabinet approved the Auction Advisory Committee.
• The Federal Government may issue a policy direction to conduct a spectrum auction.

The Federal Cabinet is expected to approve the formation of the Auction Advisory Committee, which will include GHQ and ISI representatives, on Friday.

The Auction Advisory Committee will supervise NGMS spectrum auctions. Friday’s cabinet meeting is led by Shehbaz Sharif.

Cabinet may ratify ECC committee-formation resolution.

The Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunications requested an Auction Advisory Committee to oversee NGMS spectrum auctions in Pakistan. Miftah Ismail chaired and approved the summary.

The Federal Government constituted an Advisory Committee on “Releasing Next Generation Mobile Services (NGMS) Spectrum in Pakistan to improve Mobile Broadband Services amid COVID-19” in October 2020. AJ&K and GB were added in March 2021.

The MoIT&T published the policy Directive on 4 August 2021 after the Federal Cabinet adopted the ECC’s policy recommendations.

Spectrum auctions for NGMS in Pakistan were held in 2014, 2016, 2017, and 2021. 30 MHz in the 1900/2100 MHz band, 29 MHz in the 1800 MHz band, and 10 MHz in the 850 MHz spectrum were auctioned.

Frontier Economics helped PTA auction spectrum in 2021. PTML/Ufone bought 29 in the 1800 MHz band for 15 years.

The Federal Government may issue a policy direction to hold a spectrum auction under section 8(2) of the Pakistan Telecommunication (Re-organization) Act 1996 to offer available frequency bands to all interested new and present operators.

Previous spectrum auctions were overseen by a Prime Minister/Federal Cabinet Advisory Committee. In a similar vein, the Ministry recommended the following composition and ToRs for an Advisory Committee:

Federal Minister for Finance & Revenue (Chairman), Federal Minister for IT & Telecommunications, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Division, Secretary, Finance Division, Secretary, IT & Telecom Division, Secretary, Law & Justice Division, Chairman, PTA, Executive Director, FAB, GHQ Representative, Director General Tech — ISI, Member Legal MOIT, Member Telecom, MOIT&T (Committee Secretary), and anyone else the Committee may co-opt.

The committee’s tasks include analysing and finalising the Federal Government’s Policy Directive for the release of NGMS spectrum in Pakistan, as well as managing spectrum auctions/releases.

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