BY SAM ALFAN.
The country’s largest telco Safaricom has a suffered a blow in an appeal against a Sh452, 868 award given to a customer who lost his money through SIM swap.
Court of Appeal judge Patrick Kiage dismissed Safaricom’s justification for filing the appeal against the award given to Ronald Kafwa as lame as protests by Azimio la Umoja coalition over high cost of living, could not stop the telco from filing the case.
The customer sued Safaricom after scammers hacked into and withdrew money from his Mpesa account.
The High Court had upheld a decision of the Small Claims Courts, which found Safaricom liable because scammers still withdrew the money even after the customer brought it to the attention of the mobile operator.
In the appeal, Safaricom tried shifting the blame to the customer arguing that he is responsible for keeping his PIN confidential to ensure that only he could initiate transactions.
Safaricom said the theft of the mobile phone is what led to the compromise of the security of his account, which was in no part occasioned by the firm.
After losing the case at the High Court, Safaricom moved to the appellate court but failed to beat the deadline for filing the case. It then blamed the protests for the failure to file the notice on time.
While dismissing the application, Judge Kiage noted that Safaricom was the undisputed leader in technology space and a provider of speedy wireless internet connectivity to the country.
“It cannot have been handicapped, let alone prevented by Maandamano, from filing a notice of appeal. Moreover, Ii note that it averred that the ‘maandamano protest’ fell on only two specified dates. It was safe to file it on all the others days,” said the Appellate court judge.
The judge said the Judiciary had put in place a robust electronic filing system since the days of Covid-19 pandemic.
“As for the” maandamano” protest, mmhh… The dates given for them are after 14 days for lodging a notice of appeal had already lapsed, though i understand Safaricom to say they were the reason for the “further delay,” said the judge.
