Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service Skype is not banned in Ethiopia, a senior official in that country has reportedly told journalists.

Reporters Without Borders caused a global stir this month, after the organisation accused the Ethiopian government of criminalising Skype. The organisation alleged that anybody caught using the VoIP tool in Ethiopia could face up to 15 years in prison.

But the country’s minister of government communication affairs, Shimeles Kemal, has denied that Skype is illegal in the East African nation.

"Skype and similar activities are not banned in Ethiopia,” said Kemal.

“There is no law that prohibits or restricts their utilisation here in Ethiopia,” he went on to say.

Reporters Without Borders allegations about Ethiopia criminilising VoIP centred around the country’s telecom fraud offences proclamation.

But critics, such as Daniel Berhane, have lashed out at Reporters Without Borders, saying that the “the legislation is yet a draft and at the first reading stage”, “the relevant articles can not be understood as banning personal use of Skype” and “there is no report of prosecuting VoIP users, despite the existence of a 2002 legislation with stricter articles.”

Kemal reiterated these claims.

“Nor does the law aim to prevent IP-related internet activities, that is cyber activities like social media, Twitter,” he said.

Kemal said that the draft law, rather, is aimed at “regulating” the telecoms industry. He also said that the proposed law plans to prevent fraudulent activities “aimed at bypassing national services”, which could, in turn, diminish revenues for the country’s state telecom unit Ethio-Telecoms.

"It in no way for instance, contrary to what different claims, it is not aimed to clamp down nor restrict the use of Skype, or Google Talk or any other similar activities.

"The [draft] law aims to restrict internet telephone activities, not between telecom activities from computer to computer, but it aims to restrict unlicensed service providers who use internet to provide telephone services from internet to telephone lines.

Despite the minister’s counter-arguments that Ethiopia has not banned Skype, the country has one of the most stringent and authoritarian telco markets on earth.

Ethiopia is infamous for having banned SMS communications for two years, following the country’s contested elections in 2005.

Opposition party Kinijit used text messaging to mobilise its supporters in Ethiopia to get to the polling booths.

The East African country has also stubbornly refused to open up its telco market, as it has only allowed one telecommunication service provider, in the form of the state-owned Ethio-Telecom to operate there.

As a result, Ethiopia has one of the lowest mobile penetration rates in the world, with only 16.8 million mobile subscribers out of an estimated population of 82 million, according to Informa Telecoms & Media research.