Safaricom Fires Over 15 Senior Managers

It is interesting that even as many Kenyans cry out for change and criticize our politicians for conflict of interest in serving the public, younger Kenyans are doing exactly what our political dinosaurs are doing out there in the private sector.

Now leading mobile phone operator, Safaricom is known for having very strict company policies and employees are made aware that breaking some of the critical ones will lead to summary dismissal, no warnings. Still this did not hinder some managers from recently getting involved in very questionable dealings and using their positions in the company for personal profit. More so during the company’s recent IPO.

Insiders have informed this writer that some managers were found with double digit millions in their accounts shortly before the close of the IPO. Further investigations linked the huge sums of money to the purchase of extra shares in partnership with Safaricom dealers and other individuals which was clearly the kind of conflict of interest situation the company is against but sadly the kind of thing many Kenyans would see no wrong in doing (kwani amekula mbuzi ya nani?).

It is instructive that at the beginning of the IPO, Safaricom had told employees that they were free to purchase as many shares as they wished, but this rule was later hurriedly changed. The new rule stated that employees could only purchase shares worth a maximum of their annual gross salaries. Obviously what still happened is what the company feared and was trying to avoid. That is a situation where senior employees would gang up with dealers and other people who regularly deal with the company to apply for more shares than they would otherwise have gotten.

To make matters worse, many of them had been rubbing their hands in glee waiting for the shares to rapidly climb in value and give them quick overnight profits. As predicted in this blog in my numerous warnings to the public not to purchase the shares for various reasons, prices have been on a consistent downward spiral since they first traded on the Nairobi bourse (read an expert analysis of future projections concerning Safaricom shares.) So the poor Kenyans who were overtaken by greed, not only failed to make a killing but are now jobless in a market where finding a job is no easy task.

Other managers who were fired were found to have links with some of the company’s suppliers with a few even being shareholders. Yet another clear conflict of interest situation. But in the minds of many Kenyans this is seeing and grabbing an entrepreneurial opportunity.

According to my information the company plans to fire more managers as soon as the evidence against them is verified in the coming weeks.

P.S.: What is in this week’s raw notes (aiii, wacha tu)!! In fact I cannot dare mention it in this public forum. That’s how HOT it is. No kidding!! However you can get a FREE sneak preview of this red hot saga from my weekly Kumekucha Confidential. Email Me right away for it. It’s FREE kabisa.