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Safaricom to recruit foreign IT expert

NAIROBI, Kenya Mar 25 – Safaricom says it intends to fill one position left vacant in its restructuring with a foreign specialist.

According to Safaricom Chief Executive Officer Bob Collymore, the specialist will take up the position of Director of Technical and Information Technology.

"At this point I can definitely say the position is going to be filled by an outsider," Mr Collymore said in an interview with Capital Business.

He said the position of Director Technical and Information Technology was crucial to the company as it seeks to roll out a 4G and WiMAX network.

"Data is the next growth area for Safaricom. Technology is changing and we need someone with the expertise who will be able to take the company to where we envision it to be," Mr Collymore said.

Given its network quality challenges, the CEO said Safaricom would be spending approximately Sh28 billion to improve the network.

At the same time, the position of Director of Marketing is also likely to be filled by someone from outside Safaricom, should the operator fail to find the right person internally.

He said the two directors would fill the positions on a two-year contract and would be expected to develop and hone the skills of their deputies who will take over from them. 

He expects to have the positions filled by the end of next week.

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At the same time, Mr Collymore said the other two vacant positions of General Manager for Enterprise Business and Executive Business Analyst are expected to be filled by candidates from within Safaricom.

On Wednesday, the operator unveiled its new structure known as Safaricom 2.0, intended to support its new strategy that is more customer focused.

The leaner structure introduced three revenue centres, which has merged key business units and created new departments.

Peter Arina (formerly Chief Commercial Officer) became the General Consumer Business while Betty Mwangi (formerly head of M-PESA) became General Manager Financial Services.

The finance, investor relations and procurement departments were merged with Chris Tiffin heading the department as the Chief Financial Officer.

Les Baillie will continue heading the investor relations department while Francis Murabula will head the procurement and logistics department. Both men report directly to Mr Tiffin.

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