The stand from Telco companies for their customers to go re-register their lines is raising eyebrows as it comes at suspicious times.
Currently, Safaricom and Airtel have filed a notice of appointment of law firms to defend themselves in a case filed by a Kenyan residing in the UK seeking to block the fresh registration of mobile phone SIM cards.
Although this directive came from The Communication Authority of Kenya last month, as a response to a huge number of unregistered Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) cards being sold by unlicensed operators and agents shouldn’t the Telcos give us more time to register and only register those who have not? The new guidelines are also to stop fraudulent use of SIM cards as well as update the Subscriber information databases. Older users who acquired their lines before 2015 are not registered.
Asking subscribers to reproduce their IDs and photos is not going well with Kenyans. Neither is thereat to be deactivated or even arrested. They are also reading in between the lines with the general elections coming up.
The social media platform Twitter has been busy with chatter on this issue with some valid points being raised as well as some jokes.
The fact that every user also has to do this physically at a provider shop is unreasonable.
Offline, most people seem to be doing as they are told with long queues being seen all over the country at the registration centres.
