How does the local culture affect the acquisition process, in terms of negotiations in the

Telenor mainly have a standard way of approach relating to land acquisition, regardless if it is in the city, a village or any other place in the country. But the company has experienced to have certain limitations, mainly in the northern parts of Pakistan, like for example in

Peshawar where Telenor keeps on meeting resistance. The resistance that the company faces is mainly because of the towers and the related issues like parda. Parda means that the owners in the urban areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) does not like the towers, because setting up a BTS tower means the area will be more attractive to others and therefore a lot of people are going to want to move near the tower. So it is a reaction against to the decrease of

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the areas privacy, which these people value a lot. Most of the cases that Telenor get from KPK related to land acquisition are about these issues.

But these are very rare issues, but still some typical issues that Telenor faces in these areas.

Telenor normally follows the standard SOPs (Standard Operating Procedure), which they have made for their site acquisition teams.

4.2.8 How do you establish business in hostile environments or in areas that are more exposed to natural disaster?

Telenor does not restrict itself to specific areas, but there are certain areas were Telenor tries to acquire some land but ultimately cannot. These are areas such as army sensitive areas or other areas near for example the airfield or airports. Telenor does still make an effort on these areas, because they have to fulfil their commercial requirements, even when they now that they are going to get a straight no from the authorities. Telenor does not straight away refuse to try to acquire these kinds of site, even when they know that they’re going to be rejected.

Since the KPK region of Pakistan is quite vulnerable to terrorism, Telenor has some few areas that are considered as non-accessible. Telenor Pakistan cannot go to these areas, neither their operational teams, field teams nor their subcontractors, because of the danger of attacks in the area. However, Telenor is managing this threat by using local vendors and establishing business there. Taliban has destroyed Telenor’s BTS tower, by blowing them up, three times in a year. The Taliban has quite an influence in that area, but ultimately it is a business and Telenor has to try to reach out to as many people as possible and try to operate also in these areas.

Before going to a new area, Telenor Pakistan has to take their precautions. Before sending any technical or site acquisition teams, they send their network security team who gives advice about the safety of an area; if it is safe or not, to operate in a specific area. Telenor are only able to precede the acquisition process if the area is checked clear, or else they put the site on hold until it gets safe to operate in the area. The terrorism is obviously a big challenge in the northern regions and in the regions of Baluchistan, and Telenor cannot move freely to these places.

Regarding the aspect of conducting business that is prone to natural disasters, like floods and earthquakes, there is really not much to do. The land in, for instance, Punjab is very flat and

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there are five rivers in Punjab. So the flood is an example of a phenomenon that comes every two-three year in the Punjab. When you get excessive rains, then obviously the flood will be a reality and it will destroy all the properties and buildings along the river. For Telenor this affects the access to the sites and in general the access to a larger area. Therefore Telenor either tries to repair the damaged sites after a flood or they try to acquire a new site nearby. So geographical, Telenor gets cut off from a flood affected area for a period of time, until the roads are rebuilt and open.

Back in 2005 Pakistan experienced a massive earthquake in the northern regions of the country, where most of the property were destroyed and approximately 70 000 humans lost their life as a result. All the companies rushed to these areas after the earthquake to help and try to establish network and try to give their help. Telenor planned, acquired and rebuilt up sites in the affected area, since it is critical to have a functioning network established in these kinds of event, so the relief efforts can be coordinated in the best possible way. As a result of the work related to this horrible disaster, Telenor has now achieved to establish a good coverage in the area, even in the Azad Jammu Kashmir (AJK) which is an all military area.

These scenarios are very hard to predict and therefore difficult to establish some kinds of precautions against, but Telenor tries to do what they can and move out and help in these situations.

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4.3 Issue 2: What property system does Pakistan have and what’s Telenor’s