The Egyptian government decides to stop the telecommunications service on imported phones

 The Egyptian government began to cut telecommunications services from the phones from abroad, which are not pious of customs and tax fees, after the 90-day period ended.

The government linked the return of the services to the payment of the fees prescribed through the “phone” application, while an official of the Division of mobile phone dealers confirmed that the number of these devices is very large, and that most of the merchants received messages to pay the fees prescribed to each device.

At the beginning of the current year, the government applied a new electronic system for mobile operating governance, stipulating Egyptians coming from abroad to register their personal phones, whether in ports or airports through the “phone” application, and only one phone is exempt, and the scheduled customs duties, which amount to 38.5% of the value of the non -personal phone, and the government justified the reason for the launch of this system, with the aim of eliminating the smuggling phenomenon, and localizing the industry. Mobile and attract new investments to the Egyptian market, according to official statements.

The volume of sales of the mobile phone market in Egypt reaches about 20 million devices annually – according to television statements by a telecommunications regulator – and most of them are imported from abroad. The value of Egypt’s imports of mobile phones reached 9 billion dollars during the last 10 years, according to statements by the Minister of Industry, the full minister last October. Because of this bill, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El -Sisi called for the expansion of local production of phones.

Great Chinese and Korean companies began establishing and operating factories to produce mobile phones with a local component of more than 40%, most notably “Vivo, Xiaomi, EFINEX, Nokia, Samsung”, with a total of 11.5 million units annually and investments of 87.5 million dollars, according to previous statements by the Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat, who revealed negotiation with 3 new companies for local manufacturing The total number of companies operating in Egypt becomes 9 companies.

The minister pointed out that the number of locally produced devices amounted to 3 million devices during 2024, and targeting them three times to 9 million devices.

The head of the mobile division of the Cairo Chamber of Commerce, Mohamed Talaat, said that some mobile phone traders, who have stocks from the devices received from abroad, have received text messages from the telecommunications regulator by paying customs and tax duties to each device, otherwise the service will be cut off, and they have a single option that is to pay the scheduled tax, otherwise the service will be stopped permanently, adding that it is difficult to limit the number of phones coming from abroad to distribute it to the number of Large of merchants, but its numbers are large, he said.

According to the data of the Ministry of Communications, the number of mobile subscriptions increased to 112.06 million lines during January 2025 compared to 106.8 million lines during the same month last year, and 113.19 million lines during December 2024, a monthly decrease of 1%, and an annual growth rate of 4.93%.

Talaat added, in exclusive statements to CNN in Arabic, that some merchants pay the value of tax and customs fees to each device, and they carry this cost on the final price of the consumer, or they sell these devices without paying the fees, and they notify the customer to bear them in exchange for their discount from the final price of the device, pointing out that a message is sent to the value of fees for the smuggled phones from the outside as soon as they operate for the first time, which protects rights Consumers.

The “Telephone” application allows inquiring about the case of any mobile phone registration, and know the value of the fees due, if any.

The head of the mobile division of the Cairo Chamber of Commerce pointed to a new Chinese company that will start local production during the next June, which will raise the number of locally manufacturers, and meet the needs of the market, indicating that the government has provided incentives and facilities for international companies to attract local manufacturing phones to reduce the import bill and make them available in the local market.

Source CNN