The existing National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) board will cease making policy decisions by March when the National Legislative Assembly votes in seven qualified candidates to form a new board.
The NLA began its hunt for a new board yesterday. Persons interested in the position can apply until Jan 14, said NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasith.
The existing eight commissioners (from the original 11) of the NBTC board, including its secretary-general, will continue as the acting board until the new NBTC board is recruited to replace them. Their six-year term ended on Oct 6.
The new NBTC law, implemented on June 23 last year, allows the existing NBTC board to retain the responsibilities and authority to enforce routine tasks until the government officially appoints a new one.
The NLA committee is working to determine the necessary qualifications and selection process for the new board. Applicants can apply to become commissioner candidates between Jan 8-14 at the NLA office.
Six people applied to be members of the new NBTC board yesterday.
Under the existing timeline, the NLA committee will announce the names of the qualified candidates on Feb 5. The committee will call those candidates in for interviews after that day.
Mr Takorn said 14 potential candidates will be selected in line with the NBTC Act, with half of them to be voted in by the NLA to form the new NBTC.
"I personally think the recruitment of the seven new members of the NBTC will, for sure, finish by March. The existing NBTC should automatically stop all operations related to policy decisions once the seven members are voted in by the NLA," he said.
After the NLA votes on the seven names for the new NBTC, their names have to be promulgated in the Royal Gazette.
Mr Takorn said the existing NBTC only has jurisdiction over routine tasks. This means they will not be able to make decisions or undertake new projects that affect the broadcasting and telecom industries.
"The existing NBTC should not make or approve new regulations on important issues. Doing so may put them at risk of a legal backlash from outside parties, including spectrum auctions for licences," Mr Takorn.
"I think there may be up to 100 people interested in applying to be in the new NBTC board."
Mr Takorn said one challenge of the new NBTC board will be the planned auction of the 1800- and 850-megahertz spectra. The existing NBTC plans to auction one licence for 10MHz of bandwidth on the 850-MHz spectrum (upload and download), and three licences on the 1800-MHz spectrum (each containing 30MHz of bandwidth for upload and download).
The reserve price for the 850MHz spectrum licence is 37.9 billion baht, while each licence on the 1800MHz spectrum has been set at 37.4 billion.
The 1800MHz and 850MHz spectrum ranges are operated by Total Access Communication (DTAC) under concessions from state-owned enterprise CAT Telecom, which will expire on Sept 30.
Mr Takorn said the existing NBTC board already held public hearings on the auction formats for the 1800MHz and 850MHz licences in December. The auction draft will be submitted to the NBTC board for approval this month if everything proceeds as planned. Once the new NBTC board is formed, it will conduct the auctions.
Mr Takorn said the existing NBTC will propose auction procedures to the new NBTC, but the latter will have the final say.
If the auctions are held after the expiry of DTAC's concession in September, the new NBTC may have to implement a remedy period for the operator's mobile users remaining on the 1800MHz and 850MHz spectra in order to prevent service disruptions.
Under existing regulations, if a remedy period is mandated, mobile operators with expired concessions will have to continue providing services to users who remain on those networks.
The operators will have to transfer all service revenue (after operating expenses) to the NBTC during the remedy period. Moving forward, a remedy period will create complicated regulatory issues, said Mr Takorn.