BD Insider 172: CCI Kenya under fire for alleged sexual harassment

Africa’s largest call centre company is under fire for alleged sexual harassment. We also covered M-PESA's presence in South Asia and Sycamore's impersonation.
8 minute read
BD Insider 172: CCI Kenya under fire for alleged sexual harassment
Photo: The design for CCI Global’s headquarters at Tatu City, Kenya

Today’s letter is starting with this information that is not directly related to the tech ecosystem. An Anthrax outbreak has been confirmed in two West African countries—Ghana and Nigeria. It is a severe infectious disease that affects both animals and human beings.

Health experts have urged that people should ensure good hygiene, avoid consumption of undercook or raw meat and also ensure the vaccination of animals to prevent transmission.

Meanwhile, in tech this week, we will explore the fintech sector in Nigeria and Kenya and work culture at CCI Kenya.


In this letter, we will cover:

  • why Safaricom launched M-PESA in South Asia
  • the impersonation of Nigerian digital lender Sycamore
  • Sexual harassments allegations at CCI, Africa’s largest call centre company

And other noteworthy information like:

  • the latest African tech startup deals
  • opportunities, interesting reads and more

The big three

#1. Safaricom launches M-PESA in South Asia

The news: East African leading telco Safaricom has partnered with Terrapay, a global payments company to launch its mobile money service M-PESA in Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The duo says that the partnership will allow over 32 million M-PESA customers to send and receive money to more than 200 million people across the two South Asian countries using the M-PESA Super App or by dialling *334# and selecting M-PESA Global under the “Send Money” option.

In the coming months, Safaricom plans to expand the offering to two other countries in the region, Nepal and India.

Why it matters: “Remittances have become an economic lifeline for thousands of households and businesses in the country, connecting them to opportunities and empowering our customers to transact conveniently and affordably around the world,” says Peter Ndegwa, CEO of Safaricom. “This partnership opens up one of the world’s largest remittance markets making Kenyans more globally connected.”

Terrapay is one of the over 35 payment partners under the M-PESA Global service which enables customers in Kenya to send and receive money and make and receive payments across more than 170 countries.

Know more: According to Safaricom’s last financial year to March 2023, more than 917,000 customers used the M-PESA Global service, transacting more than $2.94 billion in over 31.8 million transactions. Additionally, M-PESA processed more than 90% of all remittances in Kenya.

Do you want to get real-time notifications whenever a story about African tech and startup ecosystem is published?

Join our channel


#2. “An app impersonated us,” Sycamore reacts to FCCPC delisting

The news: Last week, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission announced that it has delisted two licensed digital money lenders (DMLs) for unethical practices such as duplicity and the use of Android Package Kits (APKs) file formats.

According to a statement seen by Bendada.com, the two DMLs were Sycamore Integrated Solutions Limited and Orange Loan & Purple Credit Limited. “The illegal DMLs provide links to consumers to visit unregistered websites using Android devices,” says Babatunde Irukera, CEO of FCCPC. Irukera said that both lenders had unregistered apps named Get Loan and Camelloan.

upload in progress, 0
Sycamore co-founders: Babatunde Akin-Moses (CEO), Onyinye Okonji (CMO) and Mayowa Adeosun (COO)

What we found out: However, our investigations revealed that “Get Loan” which claimed on Google Playstore that it is offered by Sycamore was an impersonator. The original owners of the app which are named “Edmond Solutions” are operating with a fake address.

On Friday, Sycamore issued a statement to distance itself from the app which has been accused by several users of predatory lending. Google has since deleted the “Get Loan” app from Playstore but FCCPC is yet to release a clarification to its previous allegations.


#3. CCI Kenya, Africa’s largest call centre company under fire for alleged sexual harassment

The news: More than 20 current and former employees of Call Center International Kenya said they have faced sexual harassment and abuse at the company, according to a report by Rest of World.

Most of these employees said they received unsolicited sexual favours, harassment and intimidation from senior management staff. “I told him [referring to an operations manager] I can’t have such a relationship at work, and that is when we became enemies,” Emma, an agent at CCI Kenya told Rest of World. “From that day, he would shout at me or write me up any slight chance he got and kept changing my shifts to frustrate me.”

The company has declined to comment on the issue. Since the report was published last week, neither CCI Kenya nor its parent company CCI Global has released a statement.

CCI Kenya provides business process outsourcing services to several companies including T-Mobile, Foxtel, Spirit Airlines, Instacart, MultiChoice, and M-Kopa.

Why it matters: “Sexual harassment has been a front-burner issue in the ecosystem for a while now. This is hurting the ecosystem and affecting women who are meant to be safe at their respective workplaces,” Fikayo Obadofin, an associate at Vazi Legal told Bendada.com.

A 2020 survey revealed that the vast majority of boards (77%) had not discussed accusations of sexually inappropriate behaviour or sexism in the workplace. For nearly all of them, scandals around sexual harassment didn’t trigger the creation of a plan of action (88%) or any actualisation of the risk assessment regarding these issues (83%). In a male-dominated industry, more female victims have raised complaints on this issue, 56% of female founders and C-suite executives in Nigeria’s tech industry have reportedly said that they faced “gender-based challenges” in the course of their work.

Last year, Vazi Legal launched a sexual harassment policy guide for tech startups [in Africa] to curb sexual misconduct in the ecosystem.“Every company should have a Sexual Harassment Policy. If you are not sure where to start, Vazi Legal has put together this guide and it is available to download for free,” says Moe Odele, a founding partner at the firm.

Zoom out: Aside from sexual harassment allegations, CCI Kenya has also been accused of poor office culture including negligence, threats and emotional abuse, denied leave days and other “cruel working conditions”.

Earlier in March, about 3,709 people signed a petition demanding for better working conditions at the company. The petition also called on local authorities to investigate the company.

In recent times, outsourcing companies in Kenya and other parts of Africa, like CCI, Samasource and Majorel have been accused of “cruel working conditions”. Just last week, Kenyan content moderators behind ChatGPT asked Parliament to probe Open AI and Sama. Sama and its former client Meta have also faced several court charges in Kenya for the same issues.


State of Funding in Africa

At the third edition of Pitch2Win, Pharmarun, a healthtech that delivers medication on-demand to the doorsteps of customers won $10,000 in equity-free investment. Phamarun won the competition out of 15 finalists.

In Southern Africa, 10 fintech startups were each awarded $5,000 equity-free funding by the World Bank as part of a fintech challenge organised via the Southern Africa Innovation Bridge Portal.

South Africa was home to six of the winning startups, namely abela, Bento Technologies, Fintr, Moya Money, Sum1 Investments, and Thumeza. Two are from Lesotho – Chaperone and Prime Capital – while there was one each from Botswana (Ipachi Capital) and Namibia (FundRoof).

Find below a summary of equity funding received by African startups last week:

upload in progress, 0

Noteworthy

Here are other important stories in the media:

  • How Nigeria’s $428 million ICT backbone project is enabling rural financial inclusion: In rural communities across Nigeria, the NICTIB Project is driving financial inclusion due to increased broadband penetration but continued inter-bank transfer failure remains a challenge. Read my experience at Vwang, a village in Central Nigeria.
  • How does remote work affect African tech workers? In 2023, a staggering 98% of remote workers express a preference for lifelong remote work, citing flexibility as a primary advantage. Bendada.com’s newest reporter Levi Cee talks to African tech workers about the ups and downs of remote work.
  • How 5G smartphones are changing the game in Africa: Despite Africa’s slow progress in building the 5G network infrastructure, interest in joining the next stage of the internet revolution is still high, according to reports.
  • Inside Nigeria and Egypt’s fintech alliance to deepen cross-border regulations: The regulators of Africa’s leading fintech markets, Egypt and Nigeria have signed a deal to deepen cross border regulations in both countries.
  • Is debt financing ideal for African startups in a funding winter? African startups secured $1.5B in debt financing in 2022, marking a staggering 160% YoY growth amid a funding winter. Yet, with rising global interest rates and currency depreciation concerns, viability remains a crucial question.

Opportunities

Jobs

We carefully curate open opportunities in Product & Design, Data & Engineering, and Admin & Growth every week.

Product & Design

Data & Engineering

Admin & Growth


Have a great week!

Reply to this email and let us know your thoughts about ou

 CCI Kenya