NBTC delays approvals for draft master plans

NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasit said the board acknowledged the drafts of the spectrum-management, telecom and broadcasting master plans but did not approve them, as the 11 commissioners decided they needed more time to study the spectrum plan.

The board will hold a special meeting next Wednesday on the spectrum draft, when it is expected to approve all three drafts, he added.

He said the board also ordered the NBTC office to provide satisfactory answers to the public on why it had insisted on retaining in the spectrum draft the original periods within which the state agencies will have to return their spectra to the commission for reallocation, instead of shortening the periods as advised at last month’s public hearing.

According to the original draft, once the three master plans go into effect, the state agencies are required to return their spectra that have no expiry date to the NBTC within different periods, depending on the medium. Radio spectra must be returned within five years, TV spectra within 10 years, and telecom spectra within 15 years. The spectra used by private concessionaires will be returned to the NBTC once the concessions expire.

Some commissioners reportedly want to shorten those periods to three years for radio, five years for TV and 10 years for telecom spectra. Takorn said some of them suggested that if the NBTC office could not come up with satisfactory answers on the issue, the watchdog should go ahead and shorten the periods.

The NBTC’s telecom and broadcasting committees have already approved the revised master-plan drafts for their respective industries, having done so after the hearing, but the spectrum draft needs the approval of the whole NBTC board.

Takorn believes that the watchdog could have the three master plans published in the Royal Gazette this month as planned to enable it to auction the 2.1-gigahertz spectrum licences as intended in the third quarter.