K-NET, the company in charge of providing backup internet service for Midland Savings and Loans, has refuted claims by the financial institution that poor service led to system breakdown.
The supposed system breakdown appears to have been used as an alibi by the bank in the case in which a policeman, Lance Corporal Godzi Frederick Amanor, popularly called Skalla, attached to the Greater Accra Regional Police Operations Unit on guard duties at the bank, mercilessly beat up a woman identified as Patience Osafo, who was carrying a two-month old baby at the banking hall on Thursday.
The bank’s management alleged that they were not able to serve customers due to network breakdown as a result of K-Net’s poor internet service, a claim which has compelled the internet service provider to set the records straight.
“We notice with concern, reports making rounds on social media and some mainstream media that are attributed to the owner of Midland Savings and Loans which sought to blame the recent happenings at his outfit on K-NET, who are the backup internet service providers to Midland,” K-Net said in a statement.
The owner of Midland had, in those reports, suggested that in our backup service, K-NET was not fast enough so this caused delays throughout their branches, the statement said.
K-Net stated unequivocally that the owner’s position was wrong and “does not represent the true state of affairs as regard K-NET’s dealings with Midland.”
The statement said “K-NET, as a telecoms service provider, has clearly laid out reporting systems for “downtime” and “poor service” reporting. These include the use of e-mails, WhatsApp and phone calls to our 24Hr/7 days a week Call and Monitoring Centre. In this case, our reporting records show that Midland has, at no point, reported any issues of downtime or poor service (slow internet speed) to K-NET. Our live monitoring did not indicate a downtime or slow connectivity of service to Midland.”
It said further that “if the media reports and accounts of the assaulted lady at the Midland premises is anything to go by, it will mean that the problems with the backup service as suggested by the owner would have taken 72 hours or more and would have warranted some reporting through any of our channels,” adding “K-NET, as was confirmed by the owner of Midland, is a backup internet service provider. It is, indeed, farfetched to blame the incident that allegedly occurred on the premises of Midland on a service provider.”
K-Net said that “most importantly, K-NET has taken the trouble, since the emergence of these reports, to do an audit of the system and has not identified any faults or challenges with service to Midland, especially over the time span within which the incident at Midland is said to have taken place.”
“We, therefore, wish to place on record that, be it a connectivity issue or any other problem that may have hampered the delivery of service by Midland, K-NET, as a backup service provider, had absolutely no contributions to same.
“We, however, sympathise with Midland for the challenges they have gone through as a business in the last few days.”
It also sympathised with the customer who was assaulted and condemned, in no uncertain terms, the action of the police officer in question.