A new stretch of fibre has gone live across south-western Zimbabwe, the first leg of a cross-border link meant to tie the country more tightly into the region’s networks.
Paratus Zimbabwe and Powertel Communications said the opening phase of their joint digital highway, running between Plumtree on the Botswana border and Bulawayo, is now carrying traffic. The section switched on live on 3 July 2026.
It is the first phase of a route designed to connect Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia. A second leg, from Bulawayo to Livingstone on the Zambian border, is due to be completed in September 2026, extending the link into South Africa and the wider Paratus network across Southern Africa.
Built for the next decade
The link uses dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM), a technology that carries multiple light channels over a single fibre. It launches with 800 Gbps of equipped capacity and can be scaled beyond 10 terabits per second as demand grows.
Powertel is Zimbabwe’s licensed national carrier, regulated by POTRAZ and the telecoms arm of the state power utility ZESA. “This is a defining moment for Powertel, as the project is planned, built, owned and operated by Powertel,” said managing director Willard Nyagwande.
“Today, we are delighted that the first phase is live, carrying traffic and already delivering real, measurable progress,” said Martin Cox, chief commercial officer of Paratus Group, whose regional footprint already spans several Southern African markets, including its mobile network in Namibia. For a landlocked country reliant on its neighbours’ coastlines for international bandwidth, more cross-border fibre is the difference between a fragile link and a resilient one.
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