ADSL on its last legs in South Africa

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  By   Daniel Puchert Partially state-owned telecommunications company Telkom announced in its financial results for the year ending 31 March 2025 that its ADSL subscribers had more than halved to under 30,000. According to the company’s operational data, ADSL lines decreased from 64,959 in March 2024 to 29,770. This 54.2% decline highlights that the legacy broadband technology is slowly approaching the end of the road. Telkom’s ADSL business peaked at the end of March 2016 with 1.01 million subscribers — two years after fibre upstart Vumatel  broke ground in Parkhurst . What followed was a sharp decline in Telkom ADSL subscribers. Customers connected to its copper networks decreased by more than 500,000 over the next four years. This was partly driven by Telkom itself, which began actively switching off its copper network in some neighbourhoods. If it did not have fibre in the area, it would offer a “fixed line lookalike” wireless service that ran over its cellular ...

Zungu 'has been a major disappointment’ – Rangers legend Boyd doubts South African will play for the club again

 Taiye Taiwo

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Bongani Zungu - Rangers
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The Bafana Bafana international was among the five players in Steven Gerrard's team who broke coronavirus lockdown rules

Former Rangers striker Kris Boyd said he does not expect Bongani Zungu to wear the club’s jersey again after he breached Scotland’s coronavirus lockdown protocols.

On Wednesday, Steven Gerrard disclosed that the Bafana Bafana midfielder alongside four other players, Nathan Patterson, Calvin Bassey, Dapo Mebude and academy goalkeeper Brian Kinnear attended a house party in Glasgow.

Gerrard, in his reaction, expressed his disappointment in the players who have now been dropped from the team and they are expected to face consequences which include paying fines.

The news also made Boyd – who scored over a century of goals for Rangers – furious and he stated that the identified players have not shown to be good examples to the younger ones.

He also added that the incident has capped Zungu’s unimpressive displays at the club after the Amiens loanee was handed his maiden Premiership start a fortnight ago.

"They've let themselves down, they've let their families down and they've let the club down,” Boyd told Sky Sports via Daily Record.

"Yes you can say that four of the five are young boys but it's no excuse, especially in this day and age. They are role models to the younger boys in the academy.

“The people in the academy will be saying to the youngsters: 'Look at what Nathan Patterson and look at what Dapo and Brian Kinnear have done to get to the level they've got to, in terms of being involved with the first team'. So they are role models to the younger ones in the academy and they've let themselves down.

"It was only a few months ago that it happened to a couple of their team-mates and they don't realise. I go back to the age thing. You can't use age as an excuse. Everybody knows what's going on in the world right now so they've made the mistake and they know that.

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"Steven Gerrard has come out and said that he feels totally let down by them, and rightly so. When you consider that Bassey and Patterson have been in and around the first team for a number of months now, were on the verge of potentially being part of a title party, they're four games away from winning the league - that's not going to happen.

"Whether that is Steven Gerrard or Rangers speaking to the clubs they go on loan to, to see if they have bucked up their ideas as such. Zungu - I'd be very surprised if you see him in a Rangers jersey again."

"He's been a major disappointment since he's come to the football club and this just tops it all off."

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