ZTE Corporation, the Chinese telecommunications company, is reportedly hired to block access to the internet during and after elections, sources have revealed.
ZTE was previously under scrutiny for its role in internet shutdowns designed to suppress transparency and civic participation in the general elections. There is enough circumstantial evidence to raise serious concerns over ZTE’s collaboration with regulatory agencies to disable public access to the internet.
On January 13, 2021, hours before polling, the Uganda Communications Commission reportedly ordered internet service providers to suspend operations, resulting in a nationwide outage lasting several days. The ease with which the telecom backbone and gateways were taken offline points directly to the involvement of ZTE, which has been identified in multiple tender documents as managing key backbone links.
Investigations reveal that ZTE was the company contracted to switch off the internet during and after the general elections for five days.
One anonymous source within a telecom operator said, “We had our bids ready. Then ZTE began telling us the deal was already done, and your company will just service but not own. It felt like the outcome was pre-ordained.” The source requested anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Sources familiar with internal communications between ZTE engineers and network operators say that gateways controlled by ZTE-supplied equipment were the first to shut down on election eve, effectively blocking social media, messaging apps and independent verification of results.
Further exclusive investigation shows that ZTE’s network management software contained pre-configured shutdown protocols that could be triggered remotely.
“It was not just a temporary suspension order from regulators,” the anonymous source revealed.
The source added, “ZTE’s systems already had the switches built in; the blackout could have been executed without human intervention at the operator level.”
The ZTE technicians had administrator-level access to critical national telecom infrastructure, giving them the ability to isolate entire regions from the internet at the push of a button. This level of control raises serious questions about sovereignty and the security of Uganda’s communications infrastructure.
A cyber security expert said that such pre-configured capabilities are unusual for commercial telecom contracts and are more aligned with surveillance or state-directed control operations.
“What we are seeing is not normal telecom practice. This is infrastructure designed for rapid, total shutdown at a national level,” said one independent cybersecurity analyst who reviewed portions of the leaked technical data.
Uganda’s citizens, civil society groups and international observers are now calling for an urgent forensic audit of ZTE’s infrastructure. The focus is on understanding who exactly activated the shutdowns, how much control ZTE had independent of regulatory instructions and what safeguards exist to prevent future abuse.
This investigation raises concerns over the role of foreign-owned technology companies in national infrastructure and highlights the urgent need for oversight, accountability and transparency in telecom contracts linked to critical democratic processes.
