A Ugandan engineer, Patrick Masambu, has won the coveted job of Director General of the International Telecommunications Satellite Organisation (ITSO).
In the first round of voting Eng. Masambu beat two other candidates from France and Spain to the ITSO job, qualifying for the second round with the French candidate, who he beat by 72 to 43 votes, to emerge winner. At the elections he was buttressed with support including that of the Minister of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Frank Tumwebaze Kagyigyi.
Before his election to the top post Eng Masambu has been ITSO’s Deputy Director General and Director for Technical Affairs since May 2010.
With a three-decade experience that included stints at the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC), the regulatory agency for communications in Uganda, where he worked as Chief Executive Officer for 10 years. He had also earlier worked with Uganda Telecom, a fixed telecommunications service provider for two years as CEO.
Mr. Masambu holds B.Sc (Engineering) (Hons) and MBA degrees and his other responsibilities in the recent past have included: Chairman of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization for two years; Vice Chairman of ITU-T Study Group for Mobility for eight years and Chairman of the Association of Regulators for ICT in the Eastern and Southern Africa sub region (ARICEA).
The International Telecommunications Satellite Organization is an inter-governmental organization to ensure that Intelsat Ltd. provides public telecommunications services, including voice, data and video, on a global and non-discriminatory basis.
Headquartered in Washington DC, ITSO is a 149 member-country organisation.
