22 Nov 2010

French high commissioner challenges Tahiti's telecoms law

10:10 am on 22 November 2010

The French high commissioner in Papeete wants France's highest court to rule whether investment caps decided by the French Polynesian assembly are legal.

The assembly passed a law that would limit a foreign stake in a company in the telecommunications sector to 35 percent.

The publisher of the Tahiti Pacifique monthly, Alex du Prel, says the law targets the company Digicel.

"Operational costs will be kind of minor because they are already feeding the satellites overhead to Fiji and Papua New Guinea and so on, then they became scared. This law was only passed to stop Digicel, nothing else."