Airtel Uganda cuts off utl calls over unpaid fees

This morning, Monday 30th January 2017, Airtel Uganda released a public notice informing all its customers that they will not be able to make calls to or receive calls from Uganda Telecom Limited (UTL) effective Friday 3rd February 2017.

Following the release of this notice, we have received a number of inquiries from the media and other interested parties as well as a few false stories.

We, therefore, would like to clarify the following;

1. Uganda Telecom Owes Airtel over UGX shs8 Billion arising from unpaid interconnect fees and leased line services offered to Uganda Telecom by Airtel. As a result of the continuous default on payment of the amounts which cover a period since 2013, the interconnect agreement between Airtel and Uganda Telecom was terminated effective the 1st of October 2015.

2. Despite termination of the interconnect Agreement, we continued the interconnection services and relationship between the two companies to date, on the same terms and conditions, as discussions were constantly held with officials of UTL to ensure the debt was settled. Unfortunately, these discussions have not yielded positive results to date.

3. As a result, Management has taken a decision to terminate the interconnection services from the 3rd of February 2017 to avoid further escalation of the debt and the amounts owed to Airtel by Uganda Telecom.

4. Airtel Uganda is still open to discussions with UTL.

Airtel Uganda regrets all the inconveniences caused in relation to this unfortunate development.