Mauritiun-based pan African broadcasting network, Econet Media has partnered with private duly licensed broadcasting service provider, Dr Dish to launch its video-on-demand online streaming service, Kwesé TV in Zimbabwe.

"The talks have been ongoing for a while," said Nyasha Muzavazi, Executive Chairman of Dr Dish.

As reported by techzim, Kwese and Dr Dish finalised the deal in October 2016. "The rollout of Kwese in Africa was in stages and Zimbabwe's turn had not yet come until now."

Muzavazi also says the companies were building the infrastructure and training the installation teams among other preparations. "There also was the small issue of making sure licence fees were up to date. That was done this week and the companies are finally ready to launch."

The deal is for Dr Dish, which was duly licenced (expires in 2022) by the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) back in 2012, to distribute content from Kwese. "BAZ was notified as soon as the deal was struck back in 2016. They were given full details of the channels that were going to be offered," notes techzim.

Muzavazi explained, "We were so excited about this development that we immediately notified the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe, in terms of Section 17 of the Broadcasting Services Act Chapter 12:06 as part of the administrative and regulatory requirements. We notified our regulator that we were partnering with Kwese, and gave them the full details of the channels we were going to bring to the nation, together with a whole host of other technical information"

According to techunzipped, "This development represents one of the biggest investments in the media space the country has witnessed for some time now resulting in hundreds of direct jobs and downstream employment."