The Minister of Information Communications and Technology, Senator Winnie Magagula explained the history of how the Swaziland Electronic Communications Bill, 2010 and the Swaziland Communications Commission Bill, 2010 came into being. The Minister explained that the development of the Bills began when a draft Bill entitled the Swaziland Telecommunications Bill was formulated in 2004.
The Minister of Information, Communications and Technology, Senator Winnie Magagula
She noted that this draft Bill never came out of Cabinet as a Bill because the then developers of the Media Policy of Swaziland raised a concern that it would not be ideal to have a Telecommunications Bill that did not include aspects of Broadcasting, especially with respect to its regulation. The Minister recalled that at the time it was felt that Broadcasting ought to be regulated by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority that was to be established by the Telecommunications Act. The Minister said the process was stalled to allow for the inclusion of Broadcasting. She said the inclusion of Broadcasting gave rise to a new draft Bill entitled The Swaziland Electronic Communications Draft Bill, 2007. It was noted that the draft was not gazzetted in time probably because this was towards the end of the term of Parliament. She stated that the 2007 Bill provided for the Establishment of the Swaziland Communications Commission and the Telecommunications Regulatory Framework as well as some aspects of Broadcasting in one document. She said it was considered that the Bill should be split into workable units so that it would be easier to operationalize as opposed to working with one huge Bill that combined all these subsectors.