THE Philippine Supreme Court (SC) has affirmed the dismissal of four telecommunications companies’ frequency bid for the third-generation mobile communications technology or 3G radio frequency.
The High Court’s Second Division upheld the 2005 and 2008 orders by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC), which barred Next Mobile, Inc., currently operating as NOW Telecom, Bayan Telecommunications (BayanTel), Multi-Media Telephony, Inc. (MTI), and AZ Communications, Inc., from applying for a 3G radio frequency.
The tribunal cited Next Mobile’s unpaid dues when it disqualified its bid, such as the supervision and regulation fee of more than P126 million and a spectrum user fee of more than P9.68 million.
In its decision, the High Court said that an applicant must have “no outstanding unpaid supervision and regulations fees, spectrum user fees, radio station license fees, permit fees, and other fees” under Memorandum Circular No. 07-08-2005.
As of November 2019, the NTC named the consortium of Udenna Corp., Chelsea Holdings, and China Telecom, known as Mislatel, later Dito Telecom, as the new major player.
At the time of the NTC orders, it had already granted four out of five 3G frequency slots to Smart, Globe, Digitel, and Connectivity Unlimited Resources Enterprise.
“The grant of the remaining 3G bandwidth assignment of 10MHz x 2 shall be within the National Telecommunications Commission’s discretion subject to the required application procedures as may be required under relevant laws, rules, and regulations,” the 44-page decision penned by Senior Associate Justice Marvic M.V.F. Leonen said.
Mr. Leonen also cited in the decision the Public Telecommunications Policy Act (RA 7925), which declares radio frequency spectrum as a “scarce public resource.”
Meanwhile, the top court granted a petition of the NTC assailing a 2010 decision of the Court of Appeals (CA) ordering the regulatory body to give the fifth and final 3G slot to BayanTel.
It said it was “peculiar” that the appellate court invalidated the point system used by the NTC in allocating 3G frequencies due to alleged noncompliance with requirements but still used it as an argument for assigning the final slot to BayanTel.
The NTC gave BayanTel zero points for failing to meet its cellular mobile telecommunications service provider obligations.
However, the CA suggested that BayanTel should have been awarded 6.5 points due to external factors affecting its compliance.
The top court said this reasoning is erroneous because BayanTel had the opportunity to operate since May 2000. — Chloe Mari A. Hufana
