South Africa is under siege once more, and this time not by force of arms, but through fibre cables and Wi-Fi routers. In the name of “connectivity,” we are witnessing the second coming of a land grab.
First, they came for our land. Now, they are coming for our markets, our digital land, in townships and rural areas that black-owned Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have long nurtured and pioneered.
We are not watching history repeat itself, we are living it.
The Historic Echo: From Stolen Land to Stolen Market
The dispossession of black people from their ancestral land is one of the darkest stains in South Africa’s history. Through the 1913 Natives Land Act and decades of apartheid legislation, 87% of land was allocated to a white minority. Even today, the vast majority of land remains in white hands, with very little restitution achieved through the post 1994 democratic process.
And now, in this so called fourth industrial revolution, a similar pattern is emerging, only this time the conquest is digital.
Townships and rural villages that were never deemed “bankable” are now hotspots of fibre rollout, not by black-owned companies, but by well funded white Afrikaner corporations who ignored these areas until black ISPs created the demand and proved the market.
This is not coincidence. It is a calculated strategy of digital colonisation.
The History of Telecommunications in South Africa
South Africa’s telecoms sector has always reflected the broader racial and class divide. Under apartheid, black communities were structurally excluded from fixed-line access, and investment into communications infrastructure was concentrated in white suburbs and business districts.
Even post-1994, liberalisation of the market through the 1996 Telecommunications Act did not equate to transformation. A handful of white-owned corporations and foreign multinationals consolidated the infrastructure value chain, from undersea cables and fibre networks to mobile spectrum and switching centres, while black operators were relegated to the periphery with little capital support or policy favour.
Today, the vast majority of fibre infrastructure, including open-access and wholesale networks, remains under white ownership, decades after the so called economic reform.
The Power of Black ISPs Already on the Ground
Despite the odds, black-owned ISPs have built meaningful networks across South Africa’s townships and rural communities. Operators like Mzansi Comnet in KwaZulu-Natal, EC Internet in the Eastern Cape, UdyNet in the Free State, Bakwena Telecommunications in Gauteng, MLR Wireless in Limpopo, NC Connect in the Northern Cape, Skynet in the Western Cape, and Jireh Technologies in Mpumalanga are not just surviving, they’re connecting over 200 000 clients collectively. These networks were not funded by banks or big capital, they were built with grit, hustle, and community trust. Yet these same operators are now being pushed out of their own markets by well financed fibre giants with state protection and private equity firepower. This is not development, this is displacement.
The Digital Divide, and Who’s Profiting From It
According to Statistics South Africa’s 2023 Baseline ICT Access Survey, only 1.7% of rural households had internet access at home. In urban areas, especially former white suburbs, access exceeded 70%. The fibre rollout was supposed to close this divide. But instead, it has been used to transfer value from townships to white-owned infrastructure companies.
Companies like Vumatel, Herotel, and Fibertime are aggressively capturing township economies through low-cost fibre offerings, funded by billions in private equity and shielded by their relationships in the public sector.
Meanwhile, black-owned ISPs, many of whom pioneered connectivity using wireless and Wi-Fi mesh systems, are being pushed out of the very communities they built. These fibre giants exploit wholesale access from Openserve or DFA and offer pricing that local black ISPs cannot compete with, simply because they are excluded from finance and infrastructure ownership.
The Betrayal of the State and the Banks
The South African state has watched this play out with indifference, if not quiet complicity. I charge public finance institutions such as the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC), National Empowerment Fund (NEF), and Development Bank of Southern Africa as having failed to develop targeted funding instruments for black ISPs.
Despite consistent calls for township fibre expansion funds, low-interest backhaul financing, and equipment lease support, black-owned ISPs are treated like high-risk liabilities, while white-owned companies receive multi-million rand deals from both banks and government-linked entities.
Where is the transformation mandate?
Why are banks and development funding institutes refusing to fund businesses that actually serve poor communities and instead backing companies that only show up once the market is proven?
This Is Our Second Land, and If We Lose It, It’s Gone Forever
Let us be brutally honest: if we lose the township market to white fibre giants, we will never get it back. Just as we lost the land and have struggled for more than a century to reclaim it, once the networks are entrenched, and once the customer loyalty is locked in through debit orders and data contracts, there will be no coming back for black ISPs.
The future of education, work, health, and finance is online. Whoever owns the internet in a community owns its economy. And right now, black people are about to become digital tenants on land we once hoped to develop for ourselves.
A Call to Action for Equity in the Digital Economy
The time for polite conversations is over. There is an urgent need for:
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A moratorium on fibre rollout in townships without transparent local consultation and equitable participation.
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A public inquiry into subcontracting practices in township fibre builds.
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State funded backhaul access for black ISPs at cost-based pricing.
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Earmarked funds at the IDC, NEF, and USAASA (Universal Service and Access Agency of South Africa) exclusively for township connectivity led by black operators.
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Spectrum allocation frameworks that prioritise township and rural network operators.
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Community benefit agreements as a condition for fibre wayleaves and trenching rights.
Conclusion: Never Again
We were beaten once, stripped of our land, dignity, and economic power. We cannot allow it to happen again in this new era of connectivity.This is the land we are trying to claim, not with rifles, but with routers. Not with protests, but with policy and participation. If we let it slide, our children will inherit a digital world where they are permanent consumers and never producers.
We are not here to beg for inclusion.We are here to reclaim our stake in the digital economy, and this time, we are not giving it back.
Luvo Grey is the Secretary General, Progressive Blacks in ICT (PBICT)
*** The views expressed here do not necessarily represent those of Independent Media or .
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