United Arab Emirates (UAE) telecommunications firm Etisalat has agreed to buy French media firm Vivendi’s 53% stake in Morocco’s largest telco Maroc Telecom for $5.6 billion.

Maroc Telecom is Morocco’s largest mobile operator with just over 18 million subscribers.

Maroc Telecom also has a fixed line business while its international operations are present in African nations Burkina Faso, Gabon, Mali and Mauritania.

Maroc’s major shareholders have been Vivendi Group (53%) and the Kingdom of Morocco (30%).

The Etisalat deal to buy Vivendi’s stake comes after negotiations started in January this year and dragged on for several months.

“On 22 July 2013, Etisalat made a binding offer that valued each Maroc Telecom share at MAD 92.6, amounting to a consideration of Euro 3.9 billion...for Vivendi’s 53% stake in Maroc Telecom,” says Serkan Okandan, chief financial officer for the Etisalat Group, in a letter to the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange on which the UAE telco is listed.

“This consideration does not include the dividend received by Vivendi from Maroc Telecom in respect of the 2012 financial year, equivalent to MAD 7.40 per share, which will also be for the benefit of Etisalat. At closing, Etisalat will pay Vivendi the cash value of such 2012 dividend of Euro 0.3 billion.

“Closing of the transaction would be subject to a number of conditions. These conditions include among others, the execution of a shareholders’ agreement with the Kingdom of Morocco regarding Maroc Telecom and securing competition and regulatory approvals in the Kingdom of Morocco and certain other jurisdictions in the Maroc Telecom’s footprint,” writes Okandan.

The move by Etisalat to finally commit to the deal comes after the Maroc Telecom group has reported consolidated revenues for the nine months ending September 2013 of MAD 21,467 million.

This figure is 4.7% less than consolidated revenues for the same period in 2012. Also, the group’s earnings from operations before depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) reached MAD 12,383 millions, a decrease of 1.1% from a year earlier.

Maroc Telecom has attributed the fall in revenues and earnings to intense competition in Morocco’s mobile market, especially with regard to a transition to per-second billing in that country.

Etisalat, meanwhile, has operations in other African markets such as Egypt and Nigeria.