DD
MM
YYYY

CATEGORIES

PAGES

DD
MM
YYYY

spot_img

CATEGORIES

PAGES

Home Blog Page 4398

Kenya’s Safaricom on The Verge of Launching Mobile Money Services in Ethiopia

By
Ojukwu Emmanuel
-
0

Kenyan mobile network operator Safaricom, is currently on the verge of launching its mobile money services in Ethiopia, four months after its license was approved by the Ethiopian government.

According to Safaricom’s CEO Aanwar Soussa, he disclosed that the startup is currently finalizing plans to launch operations by April 2023.

In his words, “We are finalizing our commercial and technical readiness, and we expect to launch operations within the upcoming financial year.

“Our growth trajectory is even more exciting for us as we look forward to offering financial services through M-PESA. With a population of approximately 120 million people and financial inclusion at about 35%, 57% mobile penetration, and annual inward remittance of about $4.2 billion, Ethiopia offers a great opportunity to grow the business to the Kenya level in 10 years.”

Last October, Kenyan mobile money operator Safaricom was granted approval by the Ethiopian government to launch M-pesa in the country.

During the national launch of Safaricom Telecommunications Ethiopia (STE) in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa, the country’s Finance Minister, Mr. Ahmed Shide, disclosed that the mobile money platform had received approval to roll out its services across the country.

He further noted  that Safaricom would be allowed to acquire permits of operation and license for M-Pesa services from the central bank following the approval. The license permits Safaricom to operate in the country for 15 years, it will also operate under its original name in offering mobile money services.

Launched on the 6th of March 2007 by Vodafone’s Kenyan associate, Safaricom, M-PESA is Africa’s leading mobile money service with more than 604,000 active agents operating across Egypt, Tanzania, Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Egypt, Kenya, Lesotho, and Mozambique.

A decade after its launch, M-Pesa has expanded to 10 countries, boasts 29.5 million active users and processes up to 614 million transactions per month.

M-PESA is a Safaricom product that allows users to transfer money using a mobile phone. Kenya is the first country in the world to use this service, which is offered in partnership between Safaricom and Vodafone. M-PESA is available to the public, even if they do not have a bank account or card.

The mobile money services provide more than 51 million customers across seven countries in Africa with a safe, secure and affordable way to send and receive money, top-up airtime, make bill payments, receive salaries, get short-term loans and much more.

M-Pesa is also lauded for its social value, offering opportunities for SMEs, and playing a significant role in helping the underbanked. The platform has directly transformed households as it evolved from a basic SIM card-based money transfer application into a fully-fledged financial service, offering loans and savings in conjunction with local banks, plus merchant payments services.

IMF Calls For CBN’s Autonomy and Act Review Amidst Crises Due to Naira Redesign

By
Tiamiyu Ismail
-
0

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has called for a review of the Central Bank of Nigeria Act 2007 to enhance the bank’s autonomy and governance considering emerging problems and controversies around the Naira redesign policy of the Nigerian apex bank .

In a recent report of the IMF entitled ‘Nigeria: 2022 Article IV Consultation-Press Release; Staff Report; and Statement by the Executive Director for Nigeria released on its website, the CBN’s autonomy has been said to have been disputed due to the CBN’s naira redesign policy.

It is observed that the integrity and autonomy of the CBN needs to be reconsidered as some states’ governors challenge and issue counter-directives on the CBN’s pronouncement on the legal status of the old 1000, and 500 naira notes which is said to be in contrast with the subsisting ruling of the supreme court.

The IMF, in its article, stressed the importance of maintaining the CBN’s autonomy to make price stability its primary objective. The International financial institution also urged the CBN to abide by international standards by publishing its annual financial statements, and pruning government officials’ presence on its apex board and committees.

According to legit.ng, the IMF also recommended modernizing the CBN Act 2007, strengthening the CBN’s autonomy, safeguarding the independence and tenure of central bank officials, and phasing out some quasi-fiscal activities that may worsen financial repression and weaken the CBN’s price stability mandate.

The IMF article reads in part: “The CBN Act should be updated to make price stability the main goal, improve the bank’s independence by decreasing the number of government officials on the board and committees, and protecting the tenure of central bank officials. Legal changes should establish independent oversight, including a non-executive board and independent audit committee.

“Financial autonomy should be safeguarded through clear statutory limits on credit to government and prohibition of quasi-fiscal operations and developmental lending activities, which need to be phased out.”

‘Meta Verified’ – A New Revenue Source for Facebook Parent Company; they must thank Elon Musk

By
Ndubuisi Ekekwe
-
1

I wrote about this when Elon Musk pioneered it, noting that it would be a good feature for Meta (Facebook parent company) and LinkedIn. Today, it has been adopted: “‘Meta Verified’ will give you a blue badge along with several other benefits, including increased visibility, protection against impersonation, priority customer support, and more” for $12/month.

Meta’s testing paid verification for Instagram and Facebook for $11.99 per month on web and $14.99 per month on mobile. In an update on Instagram, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced having a “Meta Verified” account will grant users a verified badge, increased visibility, prioritized customer support, and more. The feature’s rolling out to Australia and New Zealand this week and will arrive in more countries “soon.”

“This week we’re starting to roll out Meta Verified — a subscription service that lets you verify your account with a government ID, get a blue badge, get extra impersonation protection against accounts claiming to be you, and get direct access to customer support,” Zuckerberg writes. “This new feature is about increasing authenticity and security across our services.”

For years, nobody wanted to do this until the boldest entrepreneur in our generation, Elon Musk, did it, and it is going to become an industry standard henceforth. I am waiting for the LinkedIn one as that is the only one I will pay for; I will put it under business expense since LinkedIn is my CNN, NTA, BBC, NYTimes, Economist, etc combined for business and professional visibility.

Anything that will stop people writing “are you Ndubuisi Ekekwe” even though he/she is chatting with Ndubuisi Ekekwe right there. Hopefully, when LinkedIn does that, that question will disappear and we can build more trust to advance entrepreneurial capitalism.

This is a new revenue source for Meta. I can assure you that most times, we overestimate how customers will react. Those people paying at Twitter are still there because they get more than $20/month for that visibility.

Welcome to Internet Utility 2.0 where you will pay for the privilege of feeding aggregators with data and raw materials which they use to make money. Of course, you also get value in return.

Comment on Feed

Comment 1: Ndubuisi Ekekwe Prof.. Your prediction of business innovation is becoming so prevalent now, its getting to the point it is starting to look ‘ordinary’.

The normalization of showcasing this skill on LinkedIn has moved the bar for self declared ‘thought leaders’ ‘visionaries’ and ‘influencers’

Many of them have just taken an aggressive approach to network building on here, but their content is thin, unoriginal, formulaic, lacks a commitment of opinion, repetitive ( I could go on) and above all, uninspiring.

Show them the way, please. ?

Comment 2: Elon Musk is not just a technocrat but also a business mogul.

He’s currently considering a business model in which public influencers can earn from part of advert revenue.

Comment 3: Elon Musk is on a league of his own, those who taunt him obviously don’t fully understand what that guy embodies, he’s not just bold but also visionary. If Twitter gets 20 million people to pay for blue tick, $2 billion could be within reach per annum, yet for years Twitter was languishing in the hands of people who knew nothing about running a profitable enterprise, rather it was turned into an ideological battlefield, incapable of bringing meaningful returns.

For all the beatings Mark has taken over the last few years, finally the man Musk has shown him the light, a new revenue stream is here.

This verified badge model will also help aggregators negotiate better deals from advertisers, unlike before where anything goes, if a platform can boast of 30 million verified accounts, you atleast know that there are 30 million people capable of paying for something, it’s a better benchmark than what was previously obtainable.

Musk has transformed social media revenue model.

My Response: “This verified badge model will also help aggregators negotiate better deals from advertisers, unlike before where anything goes, if a platform can boast of 30 million verified accounts, you atleast know that there are 30 million people capable of paying for something, it’s a better benchmark than what was previously obtainable.” – very revealing. Amazon Prime number is an x-factor when it negotiates with vendors. Who do you deal with? The company where 100m+ pay to shop or the one that does not even know if people will come tomorrow.

Kaduna State Government Orders State’s Ministries and Agencies to Ensure Continued Acceptance of Old Naira Notes By Their Collection Agents

By
Tiamiyu Ismail
-
0

The Kaduna State Government has ordered all agencies, department and ministries within the state to ensure that their collection agents continue to accept payments made in all denominations of the naira, old and new congruent to the subsisting ruling of the Supreme Court on Wednesday that the old 200, 500 and 1000 Naira notes shall remain a legal tender pending the determination of the suit brought before it against the Federal Government and the CBN.

According to a statement by the State Government dated 19th February 2023 and signed by the Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Communications, all the Government authorized collection agents within the state which offer the citizens a route for cash payment are expected to comply with the subsisting order of the supreme court. The Statement reads as follows:

“In line with the subsisting order of the supreme court, the Kaduna State Government has directed its ministries, departments and agencies to ensure that their collection agents continue to accept payments made in all denominations of the naira, old and new.

“The laws of Kaduna State do not allow personnel of government agencies to be involved in cash collection of revenues. The collection agents authorized by State government agencies do offer citizens a route for cash payment, and are expected to comply with subsisting court order.”

Recall that on February 16, the Governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, had in a media address implored Kaduna State citizens to continue to use their old naira notes along side the new notes without any fear while he assured that all the old and new notes shall remain in use as legal tender in Kaduna State until the Supreme Court determines otherwise. This is despite the declaration of the old 500 and 1000 Naira notes as obsolete by the President, Muhammadu Buhari .

Some of the citizens and residents of Kaduna State had also expressed pessimism and skepticism about the posture of the State Government, especially with the awareness that the CBN and the major Commercial banks in the state will not be collecting the old notes from them.

How Followers of Atiku, Tinubu and Obi Can Manage Their Mental Health in the Case of Electoral Loss

By
Mutiu Iyanda
-
0

Several reports have shown that the number of populist leaders is both increasing and decreasing around the world. In the global north, the reports indicate that the political leadership style has “fallen to a 20-year low after a series of victories for progressives and centrists over the past year,” according to analysis from the Tony Blair Institute. The Institute, as quoted by the UK newspaper The Guardian, reports that the number of people living under populist rule has fallen by 800 million in two years. Politicians like Donald Trump in the United States of America, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, and Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines gained power through populism, an ideology, political programme or movement that champions, or claims to champion, the common person. In other words, it “promotes the idea that its leaders alone represent the people in their struggle against the elite.”

In the global south, where we have Africa, Latin America and Asia, the political movement is also on the rise. These continents had populist leaders who fought the elite and eventually were elected as presidents and prime ministers. Burundi, Cameroon, Egypt, Gabon, The Gambia, South Africa and other countries on the continent have had populist leaders who eventually became presidents. A populist leader who eventually became president could only have happened in Nigeria, when President Muhammadu Buhari was elected in 2015 after “public acceptance” of his rhetoric and promises of changing poor socioeconomic and political indices. Citizens and members of the international community have described his seven years as president as having both negative and positive consequences.

As his tenure draws to an end, some of his economic policies and political decisions are having severe impacts on people and businesses. As a result, there is a need to elect a populist leader. However, our analyst observes that, for the first time since the country’s return to democratic governance in 1999, voters are undecided about which of the three leading presidential candidates to support. They are in a serious dilemma because Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Mr. Peter Obi have been campaigning using populism since September 28, 2022. Across mainstream news media, digital platforms, and community mobilisation strategies, the trio has used and continues to use various rhetorical appeals and ethos that align with populism. This is not a new phenomenon in the history of populist movements; Hugo Chavez famously used emotionally charged populist rhetoric to appeal to a broad base of Venezuelans from the poor and working classes.

However, when a populist leader fails to win a presidential election, their followers can be left feeling deflated and disappointed. In order to manage their mental health during such a time, it is important for followers of a populist leader to practice self-care and focus on the positives in any situation. After reviewing several sources regarding the psychological state of followers of populist leaders during electoral cycles in the global north and some countries in the global south, our analyst briefly discusses some fundamental tips for mental health management in the case of electoral loss.

Firstly, it is important for followers of the three candidates to avoid engaging in negative self-talk. It can be easy to get caught up in the disappointment and frustration of the failed election and to start thinking negatively about oneself and the situation. Instead, followers should focus on reframing these negative thoughts into something positive and productive. For example, if they are feeling down about the election result, they could think of ways that they can use this experience to better themselves and their communities.

Secondly, followers should practice self-care and self-compassion. This can be done through activities such as mindfulness, yoga, or journaling. Taking time to relax and focus on themselves can help followers reframe their thoughts in a more positive light and find contentment in their current situation.

1...4,3974,3984,399...7,972Page 4,398 of 7,972

© Tekedia. All rights reserved.

Term & Privacy

© Tekedia. All rights reserved.

Term & Privacy