👨🏿‍🚀TechCabal Day by day – ‘Pay taxes, lifeless man’

If the residing complain about taxes, who then will inform the “lifeless” to cry foul? No person. So, they must take the barrage because it comes.

That is the case of Sendy, the Kenyan parcel supply startup, which turned bancrupt in 2023. Regardless of being inactive for 2 years, a Kenyan Excessive Court docket dominated that the startup owes as much as $635,000 in backdated value-added taxes (VATs) and should pay.

How did Sendy find yourself with such debt? The courtroom discovered that Sendy operated not solely as a digital middleman, but in addition as a service supplier that managed key features of its supply course of. The courtroom stated Sendy acquired funds in its personal identify and set the phrases of service, which made it responsible for VAT on the complete transaction quantity.

Between the strains: The choice overturned an earlier tribunal ruling and will expose different platform firms like Uber, Bolt, Glovo, Little Cab, and Jumia to related therapy. Kenya’s rising urge for food for taxing the digital economic system is now testing how far regulators can go in treating tech platforms as full-fledged service suppliers reasonably than impartial intermediaries.

With the Kenya Income Authority (KRA), the nation’s taxman, tightening its interpretation of VATs, platforms that handle transactions, buyer knowledge, and logistics might quickly face the identical scrutiny as Sendy, forcing world corporations to both comply or retreat.

Zoom out: The large query now could be whether or not the KRA can truly gather the taxes from Sendy, with the startup already in administration. Any try at restoration could rely upon unsold property or proceeds from its expertise gross sales—if it nonetheless has money left. It leaves a poser: who foots the $635,000 tax hole? Sendy’s directors, traders, co-founders, or what’s left of the model?

A merger right here, an acquisition there, and Africa is knee-deep in a busy banking season. We’re unsure if the recapitalisation workouts happening in a number of markets are opening up these alternatives, or if This autumn is simply looking season for these money-spinners.

Customary Chartered Uganda, the subsidiary of the UK banking conglomerate, has offered its wealth and retail banking (WRB) enterprise to Absa Financial institution Uganda, the subsidiary of South Africa’s third-largest financial institution. For those who’re questioning, that’s the division dealing with customer-facing companies similar to private accounts, loans, and SME banking.

Between the strains: Following its 2024 announcement, Customary Chartered needs to give attention to serving company purchasers—giant companies, improvement, organisations, governments, banks, and cross-border commerce traders—in Uganda, maintaining its company and funding banking enterprise throughout key markets the place it’s seeing stronger returns. 

This doesn’t mark an exit for the financial institution. Customary Chartered is staying put in Uganda, however the lender can also be anticipated to promote its wealth and retail banking companies in Zambia and Botswana.

Why is Customary Chartered trimming its WRB companies in Africa? Globally, the financial institution’s Wealth and Retail Banking (WRB) section generated $7.8 billion in working earnings in 2024, in contrast with $11.8 billion from Company and Funding Banking (CIB), in line with its annual report. Africa’s retail operations contributed solely a fraction of that complete, making the refocus on company purchasers a simple profitability name.

Zoom out: Past profitability, Customary Chartered has not given a deeper cause for trimming its companies. But, for a continent the place monetary inclusion for customers has been a headline matter, it appears companies are the larger fish within the pond. Customary Chartered and Absa will finalise the deal to make sure a clean transition.

For those who use M-Tiba, the Safaricom-backed digital well being pockets, it’s possible you’ll want to sit for this one.

M-Tiba, the pockets utilized by thousands and thousands of Kenyans to avoid wasting and pay for healthcare, is on the centre of what might be one of many nation’s greatest medical knowledge breaches but. 

Catch up: Kazu, a self-described hacker group, says it accessed M-Tiba’s servers and walked away with greater than 17 million information, about 2.15 terabytes of knowledge. The group even launched a 2GB pattern on-line to show they weren’t bluffing. The pattern alone contained info for about 114,000 individuals throughout clinics and pharmacies. Kazu is suggesting the actual quantity might be within the thousands and thousands.

It will get worse: Inside that pattern have been affected person names, nationwide IDs, telephone contacts, dates of beginning, and in some circumstances, medical diagnoses and billing particulars—the type of info meant to be locked in a digital dungeon with three padlocks and one bouncer.

What does Kazu need with medical information? Extortion. When buyer information are stolen, it’s usually to allow the malicious group to extort the corporate concerned. However CarePay just isn’t having it.

Sherlock Holmes CarePay: M-Tiba’s operator, Kenyan healthtech CarePay, hasn’t confirmed the leak however has requested copies of the alleged information to confirm what’s circulating. The Workplace of the Knowledge Safety Commissioner (ODPC) is conscious of the scenario however is staying quiet whereas the case is lively.

Zoom out: The incident factors to the fragility of Kenya’s cyber defences regardless of its fast digitisation.

Airtel Cash, the cellular cash service of Airtel Africa, is rising quickly. The entire worth of transactions passing by its platform has risen to over $193 billion a 12 months, with its buyer base increasing to almost 50 million individuals throughout 14 African international locations. This sturdy progress is driving the corporate’s plan to grow to be a publicly listed firm in 2026.

Does this imply a brand new fintech big in Africa? This progress means Airtel Cash is now one of many prime three cellular cash suppliers in Africa, alongside giants like M-Pesa and MTN Cell Cash. It has grow to be a significant competitor, particularly in international locations like Kenya, the place it has quickly gained market share. 

The success is pushed by signing up tons of of hundreds of recent brokers and extra prospects utilizing smartphones, which means extra and bigger transactions. Airtel Cash is now not only a facet enterprise for a telecom firm; it has grow to be a robust fintech chief in its personal proper.

What subsequent? The large subsequent step is an Preliminary Public Providing (IPO), the place Airtel Cash will promote its shares to the general public for the primary time. That is deliberate for H1 2026. This transfer might worth Airtel Africa at over $4 billion, making it one of many greatest fintech inventory market listings ever in Africa—if it’s listed on an African bourse. The cash raised can be used to increase its companies additional into areas like digital banking and lending, to compete much more strongly throughout the continent.

Supply:

* Knowledge as of 06.35 AM WAT, October 29, 2025.

Alternatives

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Written by: Opeyemi Kareem, Emmanuel Nwosu, and Zia

Edited by: Emmanuel Nwosu & Ganiu Oloruntade

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