Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Adil Karaismailoğlu made an assessment to the AA correspondent regarding the decisions taken after his meeting with the general managers of GSM operators via videoconference.
Stating that the number of mobile subscribers reached 81 million as of 2020, Karaismailoğlu said, “We have seen with the Covid-19 measures that our country has one of the best infrastructures in the world in this regard thanks to the investments we have made in the communication infrastructure in 18 years under the leadership of our President Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Likewise, although almost everything from education to working life has shifted to the digital environment and the demand for access infrastructure has increased several times, there has been no disruption.”
Pointing out that the informatics and electronic communications sector has long become one of Turkey’s locomotive sectors, Karaismailoğlu said that the sector is growing stronger every day.
“Extra support is on the agenda”
Minister Karaismailoğlu explained that the Ministry of National Education has also carried out important campaigns for the course content provided on the Education Information Network (EBA) to the students of schools affiliated to the Ministry of National Education.
In this context, Karaismailoğlu reminded that up to 8 GB of internet service was defined free of charge for EBA for all households and said:
“We did not limit the number of students who will access this content. While fighting against the coronavirus, it is certain that our private sector also has responsibilities to fulfill in addition to the duties of the state. Our GSM operators have also stepped up to the plate in this process and achieved great things. Our operators provided support to our healthcare workers, students and citizens over the age of 65 without discriminating any subscriber. Even extra support in terms of talk time is on the agenda. They will announce the exact details themselves. On behalf of our citizens and users, I would like to thank our operators Türk Telekom, Turkcell and Vodafone for their exemplary work during the pandemic process.”
“Continued regulations to pave the way for the sector”
Emphasizing that legal regulations and infrastructure investments are of great importance in the development of the communication sector in Turkey, Karaismailoğlu underlined that they will continue to make regulations that will pave the way for the sector.
Stating that it is of great importance at this point that the companies in the communication sector continue to increase their infrastructure investments, Karaismailoğlu said, “Likewise, our GSM operators fulfill their duty at this point by investing over 10 billion liras in infrastructure every year. However, after the Covid-19 measures, citizens’ internet usage increased even more. In order to ensure that the use of the internet, which has become a necessity, does not bring an additional burden to our citizens during this period, we asked all our GSM operators for support on behalf of our citizens. With the agreement we have reached between our Ministry and operators, all our operators will provide 1 GB of internet free of charge to each of our 81 million mobile phone subscribers in Ramadan.”
“15 gigabytes per month for health workers”
Karaismailoğlu also reported that mobile communication campaigns for healthcare workers were provided in coordination with the operators as the ministry during the Covid-19 process.
Karaismailoğlu stated that the said campaigns have been increased significantly, and that they started to provide 5 GB internet and 500 minutes of voice call service free of charge for 2 months to health care personnel exceeding 780 thousand people, and that 10 thousand minutes of voice call service will be provided free of charge for 2 months to Family Physicians and Family Health Centers employees of approximately 45 thousand people.
Karaismailoğlu stated that they know that especially the health personnel working in hospitals cannot go home and see their loved ones, and said, “For this reason, 12 thousand 864 field work teams will be provided with 15 GB/month internet and 15 thousand minutes/month voice call service for 3 months so that they can talk more comfortably with their loved ones and video chat. They were separated from their loved ones for us, for our people. We are ready to mobilize everything we can so that our healthcare workers can reunite with their loved ones.”
Source: https://www.aa.com.tr/tr/bilim-teknoloji/cep-telefonu-abonelerine-ramazanda-internet-hediyesi/1816740
