‘I Hope Elon is Listening.’ South Africa Urges Musk on Starlink

Elon Musk should work with South Africa and launch his Starlink satellite internet service there, the country’s deputy communications minster said on Monday.

The service has not launched in the continent’s largest economy, with Musk criticizing as racist laws that require telecommunications companies to be 30% owned by Black citizens.

“Can you get along with us? Work with us in this journey of minimizing inequality?” Deputy Minister of Communications and Technology Mondli Gungubele said at an event hosted by Bloomberg near Cape Town on Monday.

“I hope Elon is listening,” he said.

“What is 30% share if you take into account the 70% value that you are going to make in terms of yields and profits? He could invest very significantly in the country of his birth,” he said.

Read more: Musk Row Shows Gap With Ramaphosa in South Africa Equity Rules

Telecommunications operators such as Starlink are subject to licensing regulations that require 30% ownership by Black citizens.

Laws introduced after the end of apartheid required companies in some industries to sell stakes to Black people who were systematically excluded from the economy during White-minority rule.

On April 12 Musk wrote on his X social-media platform that he can’t get an operating license for the service “simply because I am not Black.”

Satellite technologies that rely on a constellation of low-Earth orbit satellites would be a potential game-changer for South African users who’ve historically faced expensive or unreliable internet options.

Gungubele said the government was continuing to talk to Starlink. “We’re engaging on all those issues, and we hope to find one another,” he said.