Subsea cable cuts: We’ve restored service to some customers, says MainOne

MainOne, a West African digital infrastructure service provider, says service has been restored to some customers, adding that it is actively working to restore all services through capacity acquired on available cable systems.

For more than three days, access to the internet has been difficult in some parts of Africa following an incident that led to cuts in subsea communications cables.

Banking and telecommunications services were significantly hampered in Nigeria.

MainOne is part of the affected submarine communications cables. Others are the West Africa Cable System (WACS), the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), and SAT3.

On March 15, the company said repairing its undersea cables could take up to two weeks.

The company also said it is partnering with cable systems not affected by the incident or previous outages to secure restoration capacity, adding that its technical team is working to restore service.

But in a statement on Saturday, MainOne said the estimated repair time that was initially declared was for its submarine cable fault to be fixed and not for providing services.

“The repair time is to enable our services to become fully restored and independently supply capacity to customers,” the company said.

“We have already restored services to some customers and are actively working on restoring services to others via capacity acquired on available cable systems.”

Meanwhile, other telecommunication firms have also begun repairs on the damaged underwater digital communication cables along West Africa.

Speaking on development, the Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC), had said the internet disruptions being experienced by organisations, banks, and individuals were due to the damage affecting major undersea cables near Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire.

The NCC assured that repairs had commenced on the subsea cables, adding that companies have promised to work round the clock to ensure services are restored to the affected countries within the “shortest possible time”.

On March 16, Swift Networks, a facilities-based telecommunications company, said connectivity had been partially restored, noting that some customers would still be unable to access some websites.

Swift Networks is among seven internet service providers (ISPs) that have connected to the MainOne submarine cable system in Nigeria.