South Africa

APC, together with Media Monitoring Africa and the Right To Know campaign, are hosting internships in South Africa for work focusing on internet-related policy and governance, privacy, and communications.

With its appearance at the Committee, South Africa has recognised the essential role of access to the internet as an enabler of rights. It is critical for the government to continue to engage with civil society and other stakeholders to advance rights-based approaches to internet access.

“There is so much potential in rural South Africa, and with a little bit of capacity building, a lot of things could happen around affordable internet access,” said Carlos Rey-Moreno of APC's Local Access Networks project at the end of a workshop with the Technology Innovation Agency.

South Africa risks continued failures to fulfil its human rights obligations to people if the government’s austerity policy is maintained, civil society organisations have warned at the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

What are the most relevant changes in the telecommunications landscape and their implications for achieving universal, affordable access to communication in Africa? This was the focus of a workshop in Durban organised by APC and the Communications Regulators’ Association of Southern Africa.

The Third Summit on Community Networks in Africa took place on 2-7 September 2018 in Eastern Cape, South Africa, with the aim of promoting the creation and growth of community networks on the continent.

The summit, which aims to increase collaboration between community network operators in the region and provide opportunities for engagement with other stakeholders, shows that there is a sustained and growing interest in this area.

Last week, a big step was taken in South Africa in the direction of strengthening the development of community-led and autonomous telecommunications infrastructure.