The Budget and Accounts Committee of the People's Assembly discussed the investment budget of the Ministry of Communications and Technology and its affiliates for 2019 amounting to 5 billion and 129 million Syrian pounds.

 

The members of the committee asked about the reasons for the low rates of implementation of some projects of the ministry's authorities, the stages of work in the e-government project, the structure of the Syrian Post Establishment, the efforts to automate the services provided to citizens, the date of introducing the third operator in the service and the reasons of weakness of the cellular network in the Eastern Region. And that the Ministry of Communications is the regulator and the main reference in this respect.

 

In the course of their interventions, the members of the committee called for finding serious solutions to slow down the speed of the Internet, eliminating duplication between the citizen and postal service centers, securing more internet portals in some of the Damascus countryside centers, rehabilitating and processing mail in Deir Al-Zour governorate and expanding the swaida governorate.

 

In turn, Minister of Communications and Technology Dr. Ali Al-Zafir stressed that the ministry has worked over the past three months on the completion of optical cable project between Homs and Deir al-Zour at a cost of more than 500 million Syrian pounds and the development of 11 thousand Internet gates in service in Deir al-Zour.

 

Al-Zafer pointed out that there is no intention of the ministry to raise the tariffs for telecommunications or to impose fees on the communications of "Watsab" and the ministry's most important project for the year 2019 is electronic transactions in addition to the development of e-government portal.

 

The investment budget of the Ministry of Communications and Technology and its affiliates for the year 2018 amounted to 4 billion 658 million Syrian pounds