Kenya police question telecom companies over unregistered SIM cards
The Kenya Police have questioned the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of Kenya’s four telecom companies after it emerged that the gunmen who conducted the Westgate mall attack used unregistered SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) cards.
The Criminal Investigations Department had previously requested the four mobile operators to provide information relevant to the ongoing investigations on the terror attack to which the companies complied.
Bob Collymore, the CEO of Safaricom Kenya Limited was questioned at the CID headquarters located on Kiambu road, while Shivan Bhargava the CEO of Airtel Kenya was questioned at the Industrial Area Police Station in Nairobi. Michael Ghossein, the CEO of Orange/Telkom Kenya and Srinivasa Iyengar, CEO of Essar Telecom Kenya Limited (YU) Kenya were questioned at the Kilimani and Industrial Area Police Stations respectively.
Michael Ghossein told the press “I was picked by the CID at Telkom Kenya headquarters at around 7.30 pm or 8.00 pm. I was leaving the office for my house when I found them downstairs waiting for me. We went to Kilimani CID offices (in Nairobi) where I was questioned about the unregistered SIM cards on our network.”
On Monday, the Cabinet Secretary for ICT, Fred Matiang’i, instructed the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) to take action against the mobile operators. He said the CEOs would be arrested and prosecuted if their companies were found to be criminally liable. The police have yet to determine whether the four will be arraigned in court.
A day earlier the police conducted an operation throughout the country to determine whether the Telecom companies and their agents they were complying with the Communications Act and other relevant regulations.
Ten agents were arrested during the operation for selling pre-activated Sim Cards or failing to register them at the point of sale. Five of them were arraigned in court on Tuesday where they pleaded guilty.
In June 2012, the CCK directed mobile operators to switch off over 2.4 million unregistered SIM cards. The companies are claiming that they complied with the directive but detectives say the SIM cards were later reactivated.
By law, the companies are required to submit weekly reports of their compliance with CCK’s regulations. The latest reports indicate that Safaricom and Orange/Telkom Kenya did not have any unregistered subscribers by the end of September. Airtel and YU, on the other hand, had 385,000 and 298,000 unregistered subscribers respectively.