Longer wait for internet relief

The two executives of Globe Telecom and PLDT Inc.—Ernest Cu and Eric Alberto, respectively—who attended a forum organized by De La Salle University last week that had Chinese billionaire Jack Ma as speaker— deserve medals for forbearance.

In an apparent in-your-face statement to the bigwigs of the telecom duopoly, the founder and executive chair of e-commerce giant Alibaba said the internet speed in the country was no good. Ma personally experienced this problem shortly after his arrival from abroad.

According to reports, Ma’s remarks drew cheers and applause from the audience who continue to suffer broadband services that rank below in quality to those provided by supposedly less economically developed Cambodia and Vietnam.

Unless Cu and Alberto are closet masochists, they must have squirmed in their seats and regretted attending that forum. They probably thought, out of professional courtesy, Ma would not bring up that issue. By doing otherwise, he did the suffering internet users a big favor.

Ma’s disparaging remark had an uncanny timing. Three days earlier, the duopoly scored a major victory when the Court of Appeals ordered the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) to desist from further questioning the validity of the sale in 2016 of certain frequency allocations by a subsidiary of San Miguel Corp. to Globe and PLDT.

Upon learning of the order, PCC said: “We noted that a year after the sale, the public continues to complain of slow, expensive and poor quality of internet and mobile services. If anything, this has further fueled our determination to safeguard the market and promote the interests of consumers.”

Touché! PCC clearly verbalized the public’s sentiment on the issue.

As expected, the duopoly was “deadma” (feigning unawareness) on PCC’s stinging comment. Outside of doing-our-best excuse, no credible explanation has been given by either company on why the promised improvement in services has not yet materialized. Asking when that “miracle” may happen could be another source of frustration.

In the meantime, Globe and PLDT continue to engage in promotional activities designed to attract more users of Facebook, chat apps and other internet-based programs at so-called “unli” rates despite the fact that their facilities are inadequate to meet existing demands.

The public be damned if their already overloaded infrastructure is further weighed down by the additional baggage. What counts is that the companies’ bottom line goes north and their stockholders are assured of hefty dividends every quarter.

Although the PCC can file a motion for reconsideration of that decision and, if it’s denied, elevate the case to the Supreme Court, it is doubtful if it can get relief from that ruling anytime soon. This is not the kind of case that the highest court can be expected to give priority. And even if it does, its resolution would probably take another one or two years.

Bottom line, we just have to accept the fact that we are stuck (and may remain in that situation for a long time) with the duopoly and its horrible internet services.

At this stage, it is futile to look to the government for a solution to the problem. The office created by Congress to attend to this matter of national interest, the Department of Information and Communications Technology, remains without a leader since the resignation of then Sec. Rodolfo Salalima.

Unless his replacement is an insider or has hands-on experience in telecommunications, he would need at least six months to familiarize himself with the situation and come up with possible remedies.

While waiting for that to happen, we can (tongue in cheek) count our blessing that, according to the Speedtest Global Index, the Philippines is ranked 94th out of 121 countries for mobile internet, and 91st out of 131 countries for fixed broadband.

At least, we are not at the bottom of heap. We should be thankful to Globe and PLDT for these dubious honors. Ugh!