Kenya finalises Safaricom stake sale as Vodacom takes 55% control

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Vodacom has officially taken majority control of Safaricom after completing its $2.1-billion acquisition of the Kenyan government’s 15% stake in the telecom giant, just days after the Court of Appeal cleared the long-delayed transaction. The deal, completed on June 30, increases Vodacom’s shareholding from 35% to 55%, making the South African operator the controlling shareholder in East Africa’s largest telecom company. Kenya’s Treasury is expected to receive KSh 204.3 billion from the sale, alongside a KSh 40.2 billion dividend top-up backed by its remaining 20% stake in Safaricom.

The acquisition marks one of the biggest telecom transactions in Africa in recent years and gives Vodacom greater influence over Safaricom’s future strategy, including its fast-growing operations in Ethiopia and the expansion of M-Pesa across the region. While Safaricom will remain listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange and the Kenyan government will keep a 20% stake and board representation, majority ownership gives Vodacom a stronger say in major corporate decisions. The company says the acquisition aligns with its long-term strategy of expanding digital and financial inclusion across Africa.

The road to closing the deal was anything but smooth. Vodacom first announced plans in December 2025 to buy the government’s 15% holding and an additional 5% stake from Vodafone International Holdings in a transaction valued at about $2.1 billion. However, the sale became entangled in court after legal challenges temporarily froze the transaction, delaying completion for several months and forcing the government to seek intervention from the Court of Appeal.

Those delays had financial implications for both sides. Because the sale dragged beyond its original completion target, the Kenyan government remained eligible for billions of shillings in Safaricom dividends, including an estimated KSh16 billion windfall that it would otherwise have missed. The government had planned to use proceeds from the stake sale to seed its National Infrastructure Fund as part of President William Ruto’s wider privatisation programme aimed at raising funds for major infrastructure projects without increasing taxes or borrowing.

With the court hurdle now behind it, Vodacom can begin integrating Safaricom more closely into its broader African operations while maintaining the Kenyan firm’s public listing and local identity. Investors will now be watching how the new ownership structure affects leadership, regional expansion and future investments, especially as Safaricom continues betting on Ethiopia and strengthening its mobile money business, which remains one of Africa’s most successful fintech platforms.

Kenya is moving closer to forcing mobile operators to compensate customers for dropped calls and other network failures as regulators step up efforts to improve service quality. Under fresh proposals by the Communications Authority (CA), telecom companies that fail to meet stricter quality standards could face financial penalties and business sanctions and, in some cases, be required to compensate subscribers for poor service. The proposals also raise the minimum quality score operators must achieve from 80% to 90%, with enforcement shifting to the county level rather than relying only on nationwide performance.

The tougher rules could significantly impact Kenya’s biggest telecom operators, including Safaricom, Airtel Kenya, and Telkom Kenya. Under the proposed 90% benchmark, all three would have fallen short based on the latest Quality of Service assessment for the year ended June 2025. Safaricom scored 89.72% and Airtel Kenya 81.14%, while Telkom Kenya lagged far behind at 52.76%. County-based enforcement means operators could now be penalised for poor performance in specific regions even if they meet the national average, putting pressure on them to improve coverage in underserved areas.

The latest push builds on a long-running effort to hold telecom firms more accountable for network failures. Back in December 2022, lawmakers revived the Kenya Information and Communications (Amendment) Bill, which proposed requiring operators to compensate customers with up to KSh 30 worth of airtime per dropped call, capped at three failed calls a day. That proposal stalled before becoming law, leaving operators without any legal obligation to refund customers despite frequent complaints about poor connectivity.

The regulator says the tougher approach reflects how critical mobile networks have become to everyday life. Kenyans increasingly rely on their phones not just for calls and texts but also for mobile banking, online learning, streaming, remote work and digital commerce. The CA now wants Internet performance to account for 45% of operators’ quality scores, almost matching the weighting for voice services, as data usage continues to outpace traditional telecom services.

For telecom firms, the proposals could trigger another round of heavy infrastructure spending. Operators have argued that maintaining reliable nationwide coverage is expensive because of high fuel costs, vandalism, electricity outages and lower returns in rural areas. But after years of issuing warnings with little improvement, regulators appear ready to back tougher enforcement with financial consequences, signalling a new era of stricter oversight for Kenya’s telecom sector.

MTN Group says it is keeping a close watch on the fallout from South Africa’s anti-migration protests but insists the unrest has not affected its business so far. The telecom giant said there have been no disruptions to its operations or any organised boycott of its services, even as demonstrations linked to undocumented migrants gathered momentum ahead of the planned nationwide protests on June 30. The company added that protecting its staff and infrastructure remains its top priority while it continues engaging governments and business groups across Africa. The update came on June 29, a day before protesters were expected to march across several South African cities.

Why should you care? MTN has more at stake than most South African companies. Although headquartered in Johannesburg, the group operates in more than 15 countries across Africa and the Middle East, with Nigeria remaining its biggest market by subscribers and one of its largest earnings contributors. Any escalation in anti-foreigner tensions risks spilling beyond South Africa’s borders, potentially affecting the company’s reputation and customer sentiment in countries where many people have condemned the attacks. In recent weeks, protests have even spread to other African countries, with calls in some quarters for retaliatory action against South African businesses, including MTN.