Kenya’s leading telecommunication company Safaricom has announced full restoration of normalcy in its internet network connectivity across the country. This declaration comes in the wake of a widespread internet outage that adversely affected Kenya and other Eastern Africa countries
In a statement released on Thursday, May 16, Safaricom expressed gratitude to their customers and stakeholders, stating, “We are happy to inform our customers and stakeholders that we have now resumed full network capacity and stability following last Sunday’s undersea cable cuts that affected some of our services.” Safaricom attributed the restoration of services to the acquisition of additional capacity from other undersea cable providers.
According to Ben Roberts, the Chief Technology and Innovation Officer (CTIO), the internet downtime was attributed to two faulty under sea network cables in the Red Sea. Three cable system providers were reported to be in the process of repairing the cuts causing the outage. Roberts confirmed faults in the Eastern Africa Submarine System (EASSy) cable and the Seacom submarine cable, noting that it’s a rare occurrence for them to have faults simultaneously.
EASSy spans about 10,000 kilometers along the East Coast of Africa, and serves as a critical backhaul system for several landlocked countries in the region. Meanwhile, SEACOM covers about 17,000 kilometers and connects various countries in Africa, Europe, ands Asia.
