Muhammed Anas, Baladi News, Damascus
The two Syrian telecommunications companies "Syriatel and MTN" have announced raising internet and phone calls fees claiming that the reason behind such raise is for the continuation of work.
According to the statement issued by the two companies; they have set the price of 1 minute from a post- payment line to a cellphone line for 11 SYPs and to a landline for 14 SYPs, whereas from a pre-line payment to a cellphone line for 13 SYPs per minute, and to a landline for 16 SYPs, while the price of 1 megabyte of third-generation "3G" service in pre and post payment lines had risen to 11 SYPs.
The companies attribute this rise to the increasing expenses and the damage of a large part of the network during the ongoing situations, taking into consideration that the expenses of these companies are in foreign currency, while their revenues are in Syrian pounds. Thus, it has become quite difficult to balance between the expenses and income.
This is the second time that Syrian telecoms raise the prices of calls, as they had been raised in last April from 6.5 SYP to 9 SYP.
The companies' decision come during the financial crisis experienced by all Syrians, especially that the Syrian pound exchange rate exceeded more than 600 SYP against one US dollar.
The decision of the rise coincided with the issuance of a resolution by the Syrian ministry of transport on Tuesday to suspend the license of Al-Sham Wings airlines owned by Rami Makhlouf for 30 days as well as stopping all kinds of shipments accompanying the passengers and preventing the plane's captain, his assistant, and the rest of the staff; engineers and technicians from flying for 90 days.
Iyad Zidan, the director general of Civil Aviation said in statements reported by "Al-Ba'th" newspaper of the regime that the reason behind the penalty is because of the excess luggage on the plan of Al-Sham Wings airlines. However, some observers confirmed the outbreak of severe disputes among Rami Makhlouf, Maher and Bashar Al-Assad after the death of Anisa Makhlouf, the mother of Bashar Al-Assad and the aunt of Rami Makhlouf. The decision of suspending the work of Al-Sham Wings airlines was valid since 10 days, but hadn't been declared till yesterday which indicates that there was a period of time to avoid the disputes before publishing the decision which came after the failure of negotiations.