WASHINGTON-MCI is working with the Pentagon to provide mobile-phone service in Iraq, but it is unclear whether the embattled long-distance telephone company has an inside track to bring large-scale commercial wireless service to the war-torn country.
“Yes, we have been awarded the contract, and we are scheduled for implementation in June,” said Natasha Haubold, an MCI spokeswoman.
The Department of Defense did not return calls for comment on the mobile-phone contract, which uncharacteristically was not handled by the Pentagon’s Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance. The Bush administration recently decided not to award a major mobile-phone contract as part of efforts to rebuild Iraq, despite indications that military leaders, U.S. contractors, humanitarian workers and Iraqi government officials are in desperate need of communications.
MCI, which declined to reveal the dollar value of the contract, said details on the deal would have to come from DoD’s Linton Wells II.
Wells is principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for command, control, communications and intelligence. Wells also is temporarily assuming oversight of military spectrum policy until a replacement is found for Steven Price, who resigned from the Pentagon earlier this month.
MCI, formerly WorldCom Inc. and which could emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection later this year, teamed with Afghan Wireless Communications Co.-a unit of New York-based Telephone Systems-to expand GSM mobile-phone service. But the Pentagon was not involved in that contact.
Sources said the contract appears to be limited-perhaps supporting only 5,000 to10,000 mobile phones. They said roaming beyond Baghdad might not even be possible because the MCI wireless network will operate on GSM radio frequencies different than those used in surrounding countries.
Interwave Communications International Ltd., which announced plans to open an office in Baghdad to address urgent demand for mobile-phone service in the Iraqi capital, declined to say whether it is assisting MCI to provide stop-gap wireless service in Baghdad.
