TNM explains network outage
Mobile telecommunications service provider TNM said yesterday the network outage its subscribers experienced on Monday afternoon resulted from a breakdown of both its backup and line network cables.
TNM head of marketing Sobhuza Ngwenya, in an interview in Blantyre, said the fault came about due to vandalism of the network cables that connect Blantyre and Lilongwe at Bawi in Ntcheu and Songani in Zomba.
He said: “In a normal case, we use the redundant line network which goes through Zomba to Lilongwe, but this time around, it was also down. We do realise that the problem inconvenienced our customers, but it was beyond our control.”
Ngwenya said TNM will extend apologies to its customers through text messages and the radio.
On Monday, The Nation failed to reach Ngwenya, contrary to our inadvertent suggestion that he said he could respond later as reported yesterday.
Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (Macra) public relations officer Blessings Phumisa on Monday said the regulator had learnt about the development that disrupted TNM and Malawi Telecommunications Limited (MTL) networks.TNM boasts of 2.6 million customers across Malawi, some of whom openly complained about the service disruption.
Instead of sending the apologies, we are getting messages of a launch of TNM games. Some of the subscribers have no time for games on their phones. This tells you how serious, or the lack of it, TNM is.