Oh UNN. Love it or hate it, it has made its grand entrance in Dec 2018 and it is here to stay. But right off the bat, the UNN did not receive a good reception from a portion of the public despite its well-meant mission to modernise and improve the country’s network capabilities. Im sure everyone agrees that our network capability needs some catching up to do. There are areas in the country that have no internet connection for god’s sake! And don’t get me started on the dismal internet speed. Finally, some action. With all the hype about fourth industrial revolution, IoTs, smart city and smart everything, its high time for the ICT people to walk the talk and put their money where their mouths are.

So, why are there people who are not happy with this development. I think its all about timing. The sleepy Bruneians are still reeling from the shock of the Hengyi presence at the Pulau Muara Besar and the sudden surge of Chinese nationals in the thousands that came with it. Despite the massive FDI project will boost the country’s economy, all the public can relate to is the immediate impact from it that they directly felt. It is the culture shock, only that this time it is felt by the people of the host country, not the visiting nationals. The out of the blue announcement of the upcoming Star City Megamall and its showroom building that suddenly appeared overnight at Batu Besurat didn’t help the situation.

At a time when the Chinese presence is not sinking in yet, the faint-hearted Bruneians are hit with another wave of culture shock – the sudden in-your-face presence of Bangladeshis. I would say beginning 2018, locals began to notice Bangladeshis being everywhere they turn. To be fair, there are explainable reasons for this [Elephant in The Room] but their apparent massive presence is enough to make Bruneians jittery.

Now, going back to UNN. Like I said, its all about the timing. Town hall meetings have been conducted since early this year for the staff of the three telcos to inform them whats going on and what to expect following the takeover by UNN. Recently, recordings of the town hall meeting went viral which showed snippets of what have been mentioned.

In one video:

Lady in audience: Basically our jobs are at risk. Guy on stage: There is no job, there is no….what do you mean you have a job? Lady in audience: So basically….. we are jobless, we are just having salaries? Guy on stage: Yes. Yesss.

Sounded like a heavy stuff they were discussing. The wider public who received the video shared on whatsapp, although not being there and not knowing the full story, only went on with what they heard in the short clip – “There is no job”. This really strikes a chord with the public, especially at a time when unemployment in the country is a trending issue.

In the business world, layoffs are often a natural outcome of mergers or takeovers of companies, but they don’t happen in all situations. In the case of the UNN formation, the three telcos and the UNN are GLCs, so buffers to the layoff impact can be expected. However, it looked like there seemed to be a communication breakdown during the meetings since instead of getting all excited about a prospect of a more exciting service to the public, the people are worried that they will lose their jobs and fall into the unemployment abyss.

The press coverage about the UNN takeover didn’t help the situation, especially the image of the UNN CEO, who is a German receiving the big red fake UNN key. He, together with six other fellow Germans from the Deutsche Telekom Group made up the management team of UNN. The Germans left their families and the comfort of their home country behind to come here to help us develop and modernise our sad ICT system. But, despite this well intention, all that occupied the minds of Bruneians are that “here come more foreigners”.

I would take all the public grievances about the broadband coverage, stability and internet speed and show in a promotional UNN launching video a scenario where the UNN helped make all those issues go away, people at the rural areas are enjoying good and stable coverage, no more annoying loading circle while watching youtube or Netflix, downloading completed just in minutes instead of hours, Bruneians, adults and kids, bosses, employees, students and retirees, all smiling and happy, enjoying the digital nirvana created by UNN. The public would certainly welcome UNN with arms wide open.

I personally believe that no one employed in the 3 telcos will lose their source of income over the UNN takeover. I just hope that five years are enough time for the Germans to pass on their wisdoms and prepare the locals to takeover management of the UNN. Employment drama aside, lets look forward to what the UNN is here to deliver. Its mid-term aim to build more towers to address connectivity issues and make services available everywhere, is something pretty exciting to watch out for.