 Welcome to GSR 2019, the Global Symposium for Regulators 2019 here in Port Vila, Vanuatu, where I'm very pleased to be joining the studio today by Fable Mbashabi, who is the president of RCEP, the regulator for Benin. Welcome to the studio. Thank you very much. Now I'd like to start off by talking a little bit about the fact that I understand you attended the first GSR in the year 2000. How has the world changed since then, and perhaps you could share a little bit of your experiences back then and now? Yes, thank you. First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the people and the high authority of Vanuatu for having here, for their hospitality and for facilitating this GSR conference. Yes, I was attending the 2000 GSR, which was actually the first one. And at that time, I was not regulator. I was not a regulator. I was on the other side. I was an operator representing IntelSat, a satellite service provider. At that time, I was the vice president for Africa at IntelSat. And at that time, we had, I think, 51 or 52 African countries, and only one was allowing competition in telecoms. That was South Africa. And I was trying to get a broadcaster license in Nigeria, and that was that communication. So I was talking to the regulator of Nigeria at that time, NCC, Ernest Ndukwe, was the chief executive. And she said, oh, I will be attending a conference for regulators, come over to discuss how I got there, to meet him and try to explain to him and to the African regulators why they should open the market in their countries. So for me, it was a good conference, not as a regulator, but as an operator trying to talk, I mean, the African regulator into opening the market, which ultimately happened. So that's, for me, it's a very memorable event, and I still have in mind that GSR conference. And how's this one comparing to previous conferences? This one, you know, we have gone a long way. Now, you know, all the African markets, except two or three, are still under monopoly. You have Eritrea, you have Ethiopia, which are still under monopoly, but maybe not for long. So things have changed. At that time, in 2000, people were saying that, you know, there were more telephone lines in Manhattan than in the whole Africa. And today, nobody can say that because telephone penetration in Africa is 47%. So things have changed. We're talking about not only mobile, we're talking about it used to be only fixed lines. We talk mobile, we talk direct, no communication between countries. You don't have to transmit via the UK to reach another African country or France. So we have direct communication. We used to have satire, no fiber. Today, we have fiber everywhere. So things have changed. We have gone a long way. And today, in Africa, you know, there are more people having access to telephone than electricity. Yet, we still have a long way to go because what we have to do and what we are discussing today is how to bridge the gap, how to close the gap between cities and the countryside, between rural areas and urban areas. That is something huge to do. In fact, the theme for this year's conference is inclusive connectivity, the future of regulation. I really wanted to find out, of course, you mentioned rural as opposed to urban connectivity. But of course, there's also, we had guests here talking about tailored content to attract more people to be connected. But what other challenges are you facing as a regulator? As a regulator, the key challenge we're facing is the pacing challenge. Because we operators, we operate in an environment which is totally different from the one for which the regulation has been designed. Because of pacing, you know, technology goes faster than the legislation. So that's one problem. The second problem is we talk about, you know, bridging, giving connectivity to everyone. But what we have to do is to elevate that priority at national level. So that it becomes the priority of the government, so political will. And then for regulators, it will be easier for us to lower the barrier, the entry barrier to SME to new entrants in the market, to investors. So we will be able to create a business conducive environment for people to come and invest. That means we have to have all the rules in place to protect the investment. We have to lower the barrier by allowing lowering number of custom duties on the equipment, facilitate, I mean, equipment sharing, infrastructure sharing. So all those things need to be put in place. And also, when it facilitates, you know, new business models to come in place. Because today you cannot finance using the traditional funding modes. Because it won't work. The payback will be long and the return of investment very low. So we have to find other models. And also involve civil society, the community in rolling out universal service. In the past it used to be a government, you know. It's not working. So we have to rethink universal service. And the players in that universal service should not be only the government. The house society, the community. Those are things we have to do. And I think it's doable. It's doable. Personally, I'm very involved because, you know, fortunately I'm one of the board members of BDT SS and DM. Actually, it's an advisory board of BDT. And we are, you know, communicating all the time. So they help me because I, too, they issue guidelines, support us. You need, you know, technical assistance. You will get it from BDT. So frankly, they are supportive. And also helping us define our strategy. The smart sustainable development model. Smart sustainable development model. Yeah, so I'm one of the board members. So actually, we're doing what we had to do. They cannot come and build the net for us, but they can help, advise, help us, you know, build our strategies. And we are doing that very well. Personally, I'm very satisfied with collaboration with the ITU. Excellent. Well, that's good to hear. Thank you very much for joining us in the studio. And of course, taking the time to come to GSR. I know it's been a long trek for you. That is my thank you very much for your time. I'm glad it's been worth it. Lovely. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Thank you.