Telcos say 98% of RP population covered

By Erwin Oliva - INQUIRER.net

The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) said there are now over 13,000 base stations nationwide operated by three mobile telecommunications giants.

This was based on a report the agency is preparing for the joint Senate hearing on the controversial $329 million national broadband network project of the Department of Transportation and Communications (DoTC).

"We're preparing a list of the total [cellular network] base stations. So far, we have a total of about 13,000 nationwide," said NTC Deputy Commissioner Jorge Sarmiento.

During last week's hearing, Senator Rodolfo Biazon quizzed the DoTC about the number of base stations now installed by local mobile communications providers.

The agency was not able to provide figures and has referred the matter to the NTC.

In a separate interview, Ramon Isberto, spokesperson of Smart and PLDT, said that there are over 6,000 Smart cellular base stations covering about 98 percent of the population. These base stations, however, cover about 75 percent of the geographical areas in the country.

Globe Telecom spokesperson Jones Campos, on the other hand, said that the rival mobile provider has over 5,000 base stations also covering around 98 percent of the population.

The rest of the 13,000 base stations are operated by Sun Cellular, said NTC Deputy Commissioner Sarmiento.