By Precious Ankunda,
PARROTS UG |BUSINESS:
Telecom giant, Africell Uganda Limited has announced it will not be registering new customers on the network effective Wednesday September 8, as date to exit Ugandan market nears.
“As of September 8, 2021, Africell UG is no longer accepting new customers. In the next month, we will be helping current customers switch to other operators,” the company said further.
Last week, the telecom company announced it was closing its services in Uganda after seven years of operations.
“Africell UG will stop services on October 7, 2021. The decision is being made in the long-term interest of the Ugandan telecom sector,” the company announced in an internal memo passed out to its employees.
Africell Uganda which has been in existence since 2014 when it purchased Orange Telecom that also sought exit of the Ugandan Market due to economic uncertainties has also announced exit of the market citing the same reasons.
“We believe that the opportunity to achieve this impact is increasingly limited. We have therefore taken the difficult decision to permanently end Africell UG’s operations in Uganda,” the company said further revealing that they can no longer achieve the dream of impacting through a digitally-led transformation of society, hence the need to pull out of the market. ”
The company which inherited an estimated 1,000,000 subscribers from Orange Telecom, had grown to over 3,000,000 in 7 years, according to the company’s subscriber analytics.
On the issue of employee staff likely to face unemployment, the company has said whereas it ceases operations in October, their last day for employment will be November 2021 and will pay due emoluments to all employees.
“In addition to a full salary and benefits during your notice period, Africell UG will offer you severance pay and payment of unused annual leave allowance,” the company told employees.
“Although Africell regrets the immediate impact this decision will have, we believe it is a justified long-term transition and we are closely supporting affected employees and customers.” company added.
