Special assistant to the President for Project Implementation and Monitoring in Zambia Lucky Mulusa has revealed in an interview with local radio station Qfm that he is waiting for the six months ultimatum he gave to MTN, Airtel and Zamtel to elapse before facilitating the entry of a fourth mobile phone operator.

In October 2015 Mulusa gave thee country's three operators an ultimatum to improve their service delivery or face the reality of competing with a fourth mobile phone operator.

The government believes a new operator will increase competition and that will force down the high cost of communication and improve service delivery.

Network congestion, dropped calls, freezing of calls and insufficient network coverage are some of the challenges customers are faced with.

Although Mulusa has not named the operator that the Zambian government will bring into the country,  sources say that the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA) has issued a license to multinational telecommunications firm Vodafone under the name Mobile Broadband Limited.

Vodafone has already appointed Joseph Gondwe as CEO of the Zambian operation while over 200 students and graduate from the University of Zambia (UNZA) have been recruited as employees and marketing agents.

The company's public network is rumoured to be scheduled for launch either this month or next.