Thanks for this....

I would like to thank MJ for providing Kazi560 http://kazi560.co.ke/who-kazi-560 - which did not look sustainable at the time - an opportunity to become a successful business helping many Kenyan's find employment. At a meeting in his Safaricom House Boardroom, I was nervous that he would say 'no'. He did not say 'yes' either. He said 'maybe'. He challenged us to prove to him that an SMS job information service would become sustainable.

That was several years back when I was the Coordinator of the Mobile Content to Change Lives project at Oneworld International. I moved on to other projects since but I remain eternally greatful that we had the opportunity to prove Kazi560 would work. Kazi560 was an idea that came to my mind as I sat on a train from London to Nottingham in 2003 after studies in Kibera and other marginalized areas in Kenya. MJ (and Vodafone funders) provided an opportunity for us to turn this train ride idea into a resource for Kenyans.

Kazi560 was a rewarding pay-back after in 2000, the launch of the then new Safaricom resulted in destruction of an RDS Paging service we were meant to launch to compete with Capital pagers. Even the brochures from Citizen Pagers were ready. The success of my final year engineering project was overshadowed by MJ's successful launch of SMS. The country gained more from the new technology.

I will have fond memories of MJ's tenure. I wish him the greatest success in his future ventures.

Wainaina Mungai

Made in Kenya Network

On Sun, Oct 10, 2010 at 9:58 AM, muriuki mureithi <mureithi@summitstrategies.co.ke> wrote:

Hi Listers

As you are aware , Michael Joseph (MJ) leaves the office of CEO on 31^st of this month after a 10 year career at Safaricom. As is tradition, we at KICTAnet bid our members welcome/ farewell and certainly this list is the tool of choice supplemented by a bash when feasible . this is what we want to do starting now – from 10 hrs today the 10^th day of the 10^th month of the 10 year of the new century we wish to take just 10 days to reflect on the MJ’s 10 year safari ---- . As usual we expect fair and candid thoughts from our hearts and mind and the daily prompting questions will provide a structure for our discussion

we shall present your candid views in style to MJ at a suitable time shortly after the closure of the list discussion----

To kick-start discussion , first let’s look back over your shoulder - just recall when he landed in Nairobi in June 2000 and went to work on/at Safaricom. At 17k customers , with barely 9 base stations , the operator was the smallest and in the eyes of the potential consumer, an appendage of the towering TKL of the day . that was then , it’s no more