575 out of 800 Telkom Kenya employees to be sacked before Airtel merger

Telkom Kenya has announced that 575 out of its 800 employees will be sacked before the merger with Airtel.

Also Read: Telkom Kenya, Airtel may merge to take on Safaricom: sources

According to a memo from CEO Mugo Kibati, the move is as a consequence of discontinued transferred business.

“Telkom Kenya must terminate the employees that are currently deployed to serve in these functions. Other employees who provide administrative and/or support services are also likely to be impacted,” the memo reads.

Mr. Kibati said the Communications Workers Union has been notified of the impending sacking and termination letters sent to the respective employees as a one-month notice on account of redundancy.

Telkom Kenya had announced plans to merge operations with Airtel in February as a first step to acquiring all of the latter’s assets.

This according to them will create a stronger challenger to market leader Safaricom, a Reuters report said.

The two operators have a combined 23 percent of Kenya’s 41 million mobile subscribers, but have long struggled to compete with Safaricom, which has a 71.9 percent market share.

The disparity is even wider in revenue terms, with Safaricom, which is 35 percent held by South Africa’s Vodacom, enjoying more than 90 percent in both voice and short messages categories.

A source at CA told Reuters that the two firms have been engaging officials over the plan to share outlets and infrastructure like transmission assets, before Telkom acquires Airtel Kenya at an unspecified time.

Additional report from Reuters