According to mybroadband.co.za, Vodacom is exploring options to reinforce or shut down its M-Pesa service in South Africa as the service, unlike in other markets such as Kenya where it recorded an astounding success, stagnates. Interviewed by Fin24, Vodacom’s spokesperson, Byrin Kennedy, said “no final decision has been taken yet”.

Though options are being explored to revive the service, it is more likely that it shuts down. In its 2015 integrated report for M-Pesa, Vodacom SA revealed that one million people subscribed to the service, but only 76,000 of these used it actively. South Africa is thus Vodacom’s smallest market in terms of mobile money transfer, out of the six markets where the group is present in Africa. In Kenya, M-Pesa recorded 11 million active users while Congo-Kinshasa, Lesotho, Mozambique and Tanzania count a total of 8 million users.

M-Pesa has been struggling to take off in South Africa for a long time. Since 2010 when the service was first introduced in the country, results were not as anticipated. Truly, few months only after its launching, Vodacom who aimed to record 10 million users had to shut it down. Three years later, aiming to provide unbanked South African populations an excellent money transfer tool, M-Pesa was launched again in August 2014. Registration procedure was simplified and 8,800 points of presence were established over the country.