Safaricom Plc is very big with many departments and from the outside it seems like a well run machine, however there exists cracks in the empire.
With billions to spare on PR, Kenyans are bombarded with its goodness but those who are smart can see beyond the veneer of invincibility and calmness. Rotten monopoly.
Safaricom is a thieving monopoly that has caused pain to so many.
Those who call this demon out are drowned by the paid activists and ads on Google, Facebook, TV and ugly walls of building adorning the many streets in Kenya.
There’s nowhere with more coordinated PR machinery than Safaricom social media battalion, but at one point, recently, the behemoth was badly exposed.
After stealing the MPESA Bill manager for businesses from a local company Kibo Capital Group Limited, and the fall of WPP Scan Group, Safaricom actually hired the services of faceless Twitter battalion mostly catfishes, to try to push the narrative that they own the e-Receipting solution.
A catfish account is a Twitter or social media account run by entities incognito with a female profile picture, posting mostly lewd content to lure male to scam them, and/or attract followers. Either way, scam.
Safaricom has been documented to have stole many a innovator’s innovation through their Zindua Portal which is now deactivated.
On monopolies, layers of bureaucracy distance executives at the top from market signals and emergent technology at the edges. This makes it bad for Safaricom which then engages in theft of ideas. Riding on bad democratic governance, compromised courts, and ignorant youth population who don’t know their intellectual property rights, they get away with theft. But only for a time. Time will catch up and some executives will see the inside of prison walls.
Okoa Jahazi
In the stealing through giving clients’ data to third parties who send promotional texts or trap some people with pop up sign ups which when replied too can be the difference between loosing money unknowingly by being swindled out of Sh30 per text. It is sad. Either way, the client loses something, including their precious time trying to fend off the Safaricom-enabled scammers.
Have you seen those messages that come warning you that you are about to sign up to a certain premium content service? They come without your consent or input. What if you answer incorrectly and are signed up? You lose money. You lose precious time.
The newest con is through the Okoa Jahazi platform where many complaints have been reported in recent past.
“SafaricomPLC have perfected the art of stealing! April, May & June, my mum & I have collectively lost 560/- in the name of repaying Okoa Jahazi debts we know nothing about. My complaints to them have fallen on deaf ears! I have even tagged @CA_Kenya but no help is forthcoming!,” MissTMoraa wrote on her Twitter handle.
She adds that it is not easy to reach Safaricom’s customer care.
I also notice such a thing with customer care especially on Twitter, they have a 20 minute delays between responses, and in the end most don’t solve issues. This was not the case before Peter Ndegwa. Did he fire a huge chunk of customer service guys? Is Safaricom low on staff in this department?
MissTMoraa’s case is just one among many.
In April 2021, we highlighted a Jos44’s post on Twitter concerning theft by Safaricom through the Okoa Jahazi airtime loan.
What’s wrong with you guys now you’ve decide to loan me credit of kshs. 20/- without my request. If not conmanship what name should we give you. I know the procedure of requesting okoa Jahazi (*131#) I didn’t press that.
Safaricom has decided to respond today via a call from 13th Feb. 2021 this is after I alerted them here on twitter. On that day they gave me OKOA JAHAZI of Kshs. 20/- without my request. Response
As you know every okoa jahazi has a charge fee. Mine was Kshs. 2/-. Assuming this happened to 1million people in Kenya Safaricom would have made 2 Million in a second. Kshs. 2/- might seem little, but cumulatively by contribution of 1 M people, its good money.
The lady says the late response is due to a fault on safaricom’s side that led to their twitter handle loose data in that they couldn’t see my tweets/DMs (coincidence sio) but how true is this? Safaricom is a different company from twitter, right? How do the two correlate?
Read more below:
Hidden Scandal: Clients complain about theft by Safaricom
The pain Safaricom has caused some Kenyans is unimaginable. This is not mentioning the scam that was the CCTV tender that cost billion of shillings if taxpayers money, but couldn’t solve Kabete MP George Muchai’s murder.
The scam that was the deletion of ICC suspects call and text data from Safaricom servers, a matter of public good washed down the drain. 2022 is here and malipo ni hapa hapa duniani.
Who will correct the thieving at Safaricom?
Many innovators have had their intellectual property rights stolen by the telco that still lies to youths about helping them through the conmanship platform such as Blaze BYOB (Be Your Own Boss) and Skiza tunes where the artists earn a pittance.
Blaze BYOB steals the young men and women time. Before they realise it, Safaricom is the enabler of election stealing that upload bad governance that keeps most of them poor and before they realize they are bitter 35 year olds with nothing to show.
In the end then, this former department of the now struggling Telkom Kenya + Postal Corporation of Kenya is just as bureaucratic, stiff and backward like the govt. It is also full of ghost workers and half-trained thieves.
It is therefore no wonder that Safaricom has perfected the art of stealing to thrive.
Woe unto Ethiopian youths, you’ve been sold for a mere USD850 million.
Read
Abuse of dominance by notorious Telco Safaricom through Zindua Cafe
