Guinea’s Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and the Digital Economy (MPTEN) says it has signed an agreement with Mali to interconnect the two countries’ fibre optic networks, partly in response to recent subsea cable outages affecting the continent.
According to a post on MPTEN’s Facebook page, the agreement was signed between Société De Gestion Et D'exploitation Du Backbone National De La Guinée (SOGEB, which is the state company in charge of managing Guinea’s national backbone) and Malian Transmission and Broadcasting Company (SMTD). The signing took place during last week’s Digital Mali event.
MPTEN said the interconnection agreement will “not only reduce connection costs, but also secure international communications, creating a more resilient and redundant network”.
Resiliency and redundancy have become high priorities for Guinea, Mali, and other African countries in the wake of a number of subsea cable outages this year that have disrupted internet communications across the continent.
Guinea only has a single international subsea link via the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE) system that runs along the west coast from South Africa to France. Landlocked Mali relies on coastal partners like Guinea for access to international bandwidth.
MPTEN said that it is currently in negotiations for interconnection projects with other neighboring countries as well, as Guinea looks to leverage its “advantageous geographical position to become a key player in the development of connectivity infrastructure in the region”, as well as a digital hub in West Africa.