Outgoing Minister of Communications Gilad Erdan is opening up a front against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is composing a Knesset bill to break up Bezeq Israeli Telecommunication Co. Ltd. (TASE: BEZQ). Likud MK Erdan announced today that he will present a Knesset bill requiring Bezeq to sell its service and content holdings leaving it purely as an infrastructure company.
Erdan said, "In recent years, Bezeq has taken every possible step to mire and delay implementation of the reform that would lower costs to the public by tens of percentage points. Therefore, I've drawn the conclusion that the right way to cope with such a powerful monopoly is to bind Bezeq to sell its content and services holdings and leave it purely as an infrastructure company."
Erdan's announced plan comes 24 hours after Netanyahu phoned Ministry of Communications Director General Avi Berger to fire him. Berger was Erdan's appointee. Erdan refused to sit in the present government unless he was appointed Interior Minister with expanded powers.
The idea of splitting services and content away from Bezeq has come up before but the Ministry of Communications lacked the conviction to implement such a move.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on May 18, 2015
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2015