TechCabal Day-to-day -👨🏿‍🚀Zambia disconnects 2 million sim playing cards

4 APRIL, 2022

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MTN IS NIGERIA’S MOST TAX COMPLIANT ORGANISATION

MTN has made some nice moves this 365 days. 

It rebranded from a telecoms firm into a tech firm, a pass that eager changing its 20-365 days logo. It also grew to was the predominant African firm to pass into the metaverse by procuring 144 plots of land in Ubuntuland. 

In Nigeria, it’s receiving some accolades. 

Remaining week, Nigeria’s tax sequence company, the Federal Inland Earnings Service (FIRS) named the firm Nigeria’s most tax compliant organisation. It’s also named the firm as one of many head 20 taxpayers in Nigeria for 2021. 

In step with the FIRS, MTN remitted ₦618.7 billion ($1.5 billion), about 13.4% of FIRS’ ₦6.4 trillion ($15 billion) complete income for 2021. FIRS’ 2021 income is its highest ever, surpassing its 2019 myth of ₦5.3 trillion ($12 .7 billion).

What does this mean for MTN?

Remaining 365 days, MTN Nigeria generated ₦1.65 trillion in income, a 24% develop from 2020. 

With its deliberate expansions, there’ll be more enhance for MTN down the line, especially fascinated by how it’s aiming to “lead digital platforms for Africa’s growth”. 

For Nigerians who bought MTN’s shares, this is able to maybe well well also mean a successfully timed investment if the firm can hack tech the equivalent plot it infrequently hacks telecommunications within the country. 

For MTN, the following stage is investing in underserved communities in Nigeria. “We are able to continue to make investments heavily in community expansion with a spotlight on expanding get entry to to below-served communities. We also belief to construct a extra 2,000 rural communities in 2022,” acknowledged Modupe Kadri, MTN Nigeria’s chief financial officer.

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ZAMBIA DISCONNECTS 2 MILLION SIM CARDS

Zambia is cracking down on scams.

Remaining week, the Zambia Files and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA) announced that it had disconnected over 2 million sim playing cards across the country. 

Why?

Honest like varied worldwide locations in sub-Saharan Africa, money transactions are on the rise in Zambia. 

In 2020, the field noticed an lift with ZMW105.6 billion ($5.8 billion) processed in cellular money transactions, a 112% develop from 2019’s ZMW49.6 billion ($2.7 billion). In 2021, that number jumped by 60% to ZMW169.4 billion ($9.4 billion). 

As cellular money transactions increased, so did felony opportunities. Several Zambians have fallen victim to scams that involve sharing their pins with scammers pretending to be name centre brokers. Others had been told to part their pins as share of registration processes for free cyber web, lotteries, and even reward vouchers. 

In response, Zambian agencies have taken stable steps in conjunction with sensitisation campaigns by telecoms, in addition to plans for the establishment of a swiftly tune court docket to deal swift judgement to scammers. 

Remaining month, ZICTA announced plans to deactivate half of 1,000,000 sim playing cards. Remaining week though, it announced that over 2 million sim playing cards—across service suppliers MTN, Airtel and Zamtel—had been deactivated to this level. 

In step with ZICTA, the playing cards belonged to of us that had higher than 10 sim playing cards registered of their name, an offence below a 2011 legislation. In Zambia, it is reportedly unlawful for any particular person to accept as true with higher than 10 sim playing cards without justification. 

Zoom out: There are over 17 million cellular sims registered in Zambia and it’s unfathomable that one and all 2 million of these are eager in scams. Here is also no longer the predominant time ZICTA is deactivating sims. In 2019, the company deactivated over 500 sim playing cards that had been identified to belong to scammers. Its most fresh deactivation appears to be a blanket lag that might maybe well have an affect on each scammers and first payment users.

DABA WANTS TO HELP EVERYONE INVEST WITH $50

African corporations restful undergo a disturbing time raising capital from exterior investors and, for many founders, the root of bootstrapping is the single viable option. “At Afrika Startup Lab, we’ve worked with higher than 800 entrepreneurs and realised that a host of younger African startups, despite being investable, lack get entry to to important-wished capital to manufacture,” acknowledged US-essentially based entrepreneur Boum III Jnr.

That doesn’t basically mean a lack of investor appetite for the continent. Africa’s startup funding landscape hit a myth ∼$5 billion in 2021—a figure that’s no longer off beam to hit $7 billion this 365 days as global VC giants indulge in Tiger World and SoftBank increasingly wait on African founders. But only a fraction of startups are ready to plot funding from mission capital and deepest equity investors.

Angel investors were compulsory in filling the funding gap, especially for startups perfect beginning out. They’re largely upwardly-cellular mavens and high win payment folks (HNWIs) from internationally who generally wait on startups through angel networks or syndicates.

But what if there was as soon as a fashion to enhance the pool of investors to incorporate much less prosperous folks (from internationally) however with disposable profits and willingness to make investments in investable opportunities in Africa? 

This was as soon as the ask on the minds of Boum and his accomplice, Anthony Miclet, as they sought to address the financing field for African startups. Their efforts to address these bottlenecks ended in the introduction of daba—a platform that enables particular person investors internationally to peek and make investments in about a of Africa’s most promising corporations, through an app, and with as diminutive as $50.

Learn more in daba desires to enable foreign retail investing in African startups and stock exchanges.

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TC INSIGHTS: E-VOTING IN AFRICA

Elections might maybe well well also additionally be an all-day affair across varied worldwide locations in Africa. It is a long way never unheard of to have complete days taken off to fulfil this frequent civil duty. For occasion, registration for voter’s playing cards, thumb printing and handbook vote casting purchase an extraordinarily prolonged time to be accomplished thereby contributing to increased voter apathy and unhappy electoral outcomes.

On the opposite hand, electoral programs and swiftly upscale in technological enhancements are nearly inseparable in this day’s world. This pattern might maybe well well also was more helpful to the African continent especially now that folks are leveraging technological innovation to resolve everyday societal challenges. Mobile technologies by myself have created 1.7 million jobs and contributed $144 billion to the continent’s economy, representing roughly 8.5% of GDP. 

Interestingly, opportunities exist to infuse skills into Africa’s vote casting task to lower the payment of conducting elections within the continent, toughen the integrity of the election outcomes and promote political transparency which has was a shut to-no longer skill task to arrangement. Areas, where skills might maybe well well also level to a game-changer in Africa’s electoral task, contain vote counting the spend of optical scanners, digital mapping for electoral boundary administration e.t.c. 

The e-vote casting plot will be one the most productive techniques to adopt skills in Africa’s electoral task. On the opposite hand, the insist of cyber web accessibility and unhappy digital literacy amongst Africans might maybe well well also jeopardize the initiative. It might maybe maybe maybe well well be circumvented by rolling out the e-vote casting plot in phases i.e. in areas with sufficient evidence to help the task.

The truth is, electoral commissions across African worldwide locations must commence up all phases of the electoral task (especially the verification stage) to knowledgeable observers. Here is where refined algorithmic adjustments might maybe well well also additionally be inserted to purchase shut parity between vote casting patterns on the ground and “verified” outcomes that “perfect” bring very slender victories to a ruling occasion.

Gathered, Africa has plot nearly of age in digital and digital vote casting. The West’s elections see indulge in Sony’s Walkmans within the age of the smartphone. Africa’s fresh leaders and technocrats will carry out the generational leap more without be troubled within the prolonged gallop, and purchase showing the plot.

Test out our funding dashboard, DealFlow to tune every deal that’s occurring on the continent in staunch-time. Also, follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn for more updates.

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