President Rodrigo Duterte has warned local telecommunication companies of improving their services before December this year or else have their licenses and frequencies revoked in favor of the government.
As a side note during his fifth State of the Nation Address on Monday, Duterte said government would use the frequencies for the distance education program of public schools, which could not hold face-to-face classes in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
The President expressed frustration over the "less than ideal" services provided by local telcos and warned them he would "revert to line telephone" service and "expropriate" their frequencies if he saw it fit during the last two years of his term, which ends in 2022.
"Don't make us wait 10 years for services other countries are enjoying. Go and look for capital; if you are not ready to improve, (I) might just as well close all of you, revert to line telephone, expropriate it," Duterte said, singling out Smart Communications and Globe Telecom.
"We are a republic sovereign country, bear (that) in mind. The patience of the Filipino people is reaching its limit. I am articulating the anger of Filipinos," he said.
Although expropriating telecommunication properties is "not want what I intend do," Duterte said that before December, he should be able to "call Jesus at Bethlehem."
Noting what he said were the local telcos' "half-cooked services," Duterte said they should "tell us now if you can't improve on it, in the next 2 years we will be improving telco in country without you, we will find a way."
