A couple of East African countries are battling with internet connectivity disruptions due to reported faults on the East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy) and SEACOM cables, according to Internet monitoring groups.
NetBlocks, in a post on X mentioned, “Network data show a disruption to Internet connectivity in and around multiple East African countries.”
According to reports, Tanzania and the French Island of Mayotte experienced significant impacts on Internet connectivity, while Mozambique and Malawi had moderate impacts.
Cloudflare also confirmed on X that connectivity disruptions were ongoing in Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, and Madagascar.
Safaricom, Kenya’s largest telecoms operator, activated redundancy measures to minimize service interruption, ensuring subscribers remain connected while awaiting full cable restoration.
However, subscribers might experience reduced Internet speeds.
The outages were linked to damage on four sub-sea cables off the west coast of Africa, affecting connectivity continent-wide. These included the West Africa Cable System, MainOne, South Atlantic 3, and ACE sea cables, critical for telecommunications data.
Chris Wood, CEO of West Indian Ocean Cable Company, estimated collective repair costs of about $8m for the four affected digital infrastructure companies. Repairing a single subsea cable could require between $1m and $2m, depending on the damage severity.
Recalling March’s events, Internet outages were also reported in West African countries such as Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Benin, Ghana, Burkina Faso, and South Africa.
