ICASA publish draft radio regulations for comment

South Africa's regulator, ICASA, has published the draft radio regulations in the Government Gazette number 33 590 of 26 September 2010. Comments are invited to be sent to ICASA before 19 November 2010.

There are some significant changes to regulations pertaining to amateur radio. The South African Radio League (SARL) will study the draft and will hold a discussion during the President's net to be held on Sunday 17 October 2010 at 19:30.

Some of the major changes are: the ZR licence will disappear and with that the requirements for one of the five upgrade criteria. Persons having passed the Class A examination will be allocated a ZS callsign.

The SARL will discuss with ICASA at the next liaison meeting the procedure for ZR's to upgrade to ZS.

There will be an age restriction on the class B license. The Class B licence will be available to persons under the age of 20. ZU licence holders are expected to write the class A examination before they reach 25 after which the Class B license (ZU) will be cancelled.

ICASA will be holding a public hearing on 1 and 2 December 2010. Soon after that the final regulations will be promulgated.

The Gazette is available for download from the members only section on www.sarl.org.za, click on members.

You are invited to send any comment before 10 October to armi@sarl.org.za.

South African Radio League
http://www.sarl.org.za

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