Non-tax-compliant mobile phones will be blocked from accessing the national network from next year, the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) has said, as the government seeks to mop up elusive revenue.
The industry regulator said that starting January 2025, tax compliance information on all mobile phones imported or assembled from November 2024 will be a prerequisite for their registration in the national master database and subsequent connection to local networks in order for them to be usable.
“To ensure integrity and tax compliance of the mobile devices in Kenya, the Authority hereby notifies all stakeholders, including mobile network operators (MNOs) involved in the local assembly, importation, distribution as well as connection of mobile devices to local networks, that with effect from January 1, 2025, MNOs must ensure that they only connect devices to their networks after verifying the tax compliance status through a whitelist database of compliant devices, which will be provided by the Authority,” CA stated in a notice to local assemblers, importers and sellers of phones, and mobile network operators in the country.
It said operators would be required to provide for the “grey-listing of non-compliant devices” to facilitate regularisation within a prescribed period, failure to which the devices would thereafter be blacklisted.
The CA wants to seal loopholes that have been exploited by various parties along the mobile phone supply chain, where taxes have not been paid, by setting new requirements from the import and assembly of devices to their connection to networks.
“All local device assemblers must upload the International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) Number of each assembled device to the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA)-provided portal. This will ensure that all locally assembled devices are tax compliant,” CA said.
It also indicated that all mobile phone importers will be required to disclose the IMEI Number in their respective import documents submitted to the KRA.
“This disclosure is mandatory for the registration of the devices in the National Master Database on tax-compliant devices,” CA stated.
CA added that it plans to improve the way mobile phone retailers, wholesalers and end-users can verify the tax-compliant status of mobile devices before purchase to ensure that they only sell or distribute tax-compliant devices.
All existing devices that will be on the mobile networks by October 31, 2024, will not be affected.
By the end of June this year, Kenya had more than 66 million mobile phones connected to networks, of which 35.2 million were smartphones and 30.9 million were feature phones.
“At the end of the referenced period, the total number of mobile phone devices connected to mobile networks was 66.1 million with a penetration rate of 128.3 percent. The penetration rates for smartphones and feature phones were 68.3 and 59.9 percent respectively,” the CA quarterly statistics report for June 2024 notes.
