CCK asked to deny Safaricom licence
A Safaricom customer care centre in Nairobi. ICTAK, an ICT organisation, has written to the regulator, CCK, asking it not to renew Safaricom’s licence over alleged failure to comply with the Constitution, sector legislation and licence conditions. PHOTO/FILE
What you need to know:
- The Information Communication Technology of Kenya (ICTAK) has written to the regulator, asking it not to renew Safaricom’s licence over alleged failure to comply with the Constitution, sector legislation and licence conditions.
- Apart from alleged failure to comply with the Constitution and other relevant laws, the ICT body claims that Safaricom has also failed to establish and publicise a complaints handling mechanism.
An ICT organisation has petitioned the Communications Commission of Kenya to deny Safaricom an operating licence.
The Information Communication Technology of Kenya (ICTAK) has written to the regulator, asking it not to renew Safaricom’s licence over alleged failure to comply with the Constitution, sector legislation and licence conditions.
The complaint follows Gazette Notice No 3115 dated May 7 in which the CCK asked Kenyans to raise objections as to why the giant telecoms company should not have its licence renewed.
CCK gave the public 30 days to submit their complaints, a deadline which has since passed.
The ICTAK complaint letter is signed by the organisation’s secretary-general, Mr Kamotho Njenga, and also copied to Safaricom.
Yesterday, Mr Njenga said should the regulator give the licence in a manner which is not convincing, then ICTAK would seek the intervention of the Supreme Court.
POOR SERVICE
Apart from alleged failure to comply with the Constitution and other relevant laws, the ICT body claims that Safaricom has also failed to establish and publicise a complaints handling mechanism.
ICTAK argues that whenever the service is not in proper operation, the service provider has not compensated clients by offering outage credit to subscribers as required under the Kenya Information and Communications (Consumer Protection) Regulations, 2010.
“The applicant has continued to offer substandard network services, sometimes under the pretext of insufficient spectrum,” it says.
“This ground is not sustainable since service quality largely depends on proper network planning and optimization rather than deployment of additional spectrum which, in any event, is a scarce and finite resource globally.”
ICTAK represents a wide variety of information technology players and stakeholders who provide consulting, implementation, support, training, and business analysis services.
Its primary purpose is to elevate the standards of the ICT profession and industry in Kenya, it says on its officials website
30
The number of days CCK gave public to submit complaints to its offices
3115
Number of Gazette Notice in which CCK gave the directive
