JEFF SKILLING, the former chief executive officer of the former corporate giant, Enron, was once asked if he would withdraw from the market a product harmful to customers.
His reply was that he was accountable to shareholders, not consumers. It may be of interest to note that Enron suffered a swift, scandalous demise and Skilling a lengthy jail term. My focal point relates to his callous disregard for the very consumers that are crucial to the survival and viability of a business.
Skilling, who was running a big corporation as a competitor in the cradle of free market (the US) did not care two hoots about consumers, let alone if he was running a monopoly.
This takes me to the natural telecoms monopoly in the English-speaking Caribbean, Cable & Wireless (LIME). Thanks to technology and competition, that monopoly has been forced to ease its grip.
The market liberalisation process is far from over because barring essentially cellular telephony, that natural monopoly is still reigning king. The saying is that a leopard can’t change its spots.
This became even more convincing in the recent buyout of Columbus Communications (Flow) by Cable & Wireless (C&W), and all the talk about benefits to customers. Yeah, right. Just ask Jeff Skilling who the real beneficiaries are. So rather than a larger pool of competitors and providers, we see a retreat to deja vu, with the original monopoly consolidating its market power.
Surely, the more things change, the more they remain the same.
Let me illustrate by using a service that C&W still more or less monopolises to epitomise the degree of neglect. On, February 19, I decided to use a public phone booth outside Cave Shepherd on Broad Street to initiate a call. With the first phone I tried, there was an obstruction in the coin slot. There was no dial tone in the second. The coin went right through in third.
I went into Cave Shepherd to try a fourth. The coin stuck at the top in the slot. With the next phone, there was dial tone, the money went in, the machine did not respond to the call, neither did it return my money. Five phones, no success and I lost my money. And talk about benefits to customers with the latest buyout of Flow.
Ask Jeff Skilling.
– PETER C. MAXIMIN
