Sonatel Workers Protest About Foreign Calls Tax, Union Says

Workers at Sonatel (SNTS) SA, the Senegalese telecommunications company part owned by France Telecom SA (FTE), began weekly demonstrations today to protest a tax on international calls that will cut the company’s revenue.

Some workers at the Dakar-based company will leave their posts to join the demonstration, which will be repeated every Wednesday, Mamadou Aidara Diop, secretary general of the Sonatel Workers’ Union, said in an interview today.

The tax, which took effect on Sept. 1, adds a 49.2 CFA franc ($0.10) surcharge to all incoming international calls to mobile phones in the West African nation. The tax is likely to cause a 10 percent fall in revenue at Sonatel, the largest company by market value listed on the regional bourse in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, Diop said on Sept. 2.

Sonatel is 42 percent owned by France Telecom and 27 percent by Senegal’s government. The stock fell 2.4 percent to 120,000 CFA francs in Abidjan today, bringing its decline since the tax came into effect to 7 percent.

To contact the reporter on this story: Drew Hinshaw in Dakar at dhinshaw@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Antony Sguazzin at asguazzin@bloomberg.net