Zimbabwe's state run fixed telecommunications company, TelOne is carrying out an exercise to clean up and identify underground communications cables the major cities and urban areas in the southern African country.

TelOne operates Zimbabwe's internet gateway, the Mazowe earth station. It also has fixed voice and broadband units that are also operational in the country.

Clever Gwavava, the network management center manager for TelOne, said, in a notice to Zimbabwean telecommunications operators and internet service providers on Sunday, that it "will be carrying out a clean up and identification of cable exercise" throughout the country's city and urban centres.

"Operators who may have laid cables in these ways are therefore urged to contact TelOne and make arrangements to identify their cables," he said.

Gwavava added the "cables that need to be identified" in terms of "the operator who owns the cable" and outlining the "point of origination and termination of the cables".

After the identification process, TelOne said, the next stage would involve the labelling of the cables with tags giving the name of operators. Additionally, the "cable owner would also be required to immediately remove any cable or any other associated plant that has been abandoned or become obsolete" in the ducts.

TelOne said it would proceed to remove unidentified cables, highlighting that the process to identify cables will aid those carrying out future maintenance works.