Facebook, Kenya’s favourite social media giant, is literally diving into Safaricom’s internet future, this time, under the sea. According to a report by Business Daily, Meta’s infrastructure arm, Edge Network Services, will co-finance and take a stake in Safaricom’s new subsea fibre optic project, the Daraja Cable, linking Oman to Mombasa.
And no, this isn’t just another cable story. The Daraja project stretches an impressive 4,108 kilometers, carries 24 fibre pairs (which is like having 24 lanes on a highway instead of the usual 8 to 16), and is designed to go live in 2026. Translation: faster 4G, 5G, and home broadband for hundreds of thousands of Kenyans who are already bingeing Showmax shows, TikToks, Reels, and endless WhatsApp videos.
The Kenyan leg alone will cost about $23 million (KES 2.97 billion), filings seen by Business Daily show. Safaricom is the project’s main driver, but Facebook is swooping in as both investor and tech partner. The Communications Authority has already received landing-rights paperwork, as per the report, giving this thing real momentum.
For Safaricom, Daraja is more than just a big shiny cable. It’s independence. Right now, much of Kenya’s internet bandwidth rides on agreements with operators like SEACOM and Telkom Kenya, with some of those deals expiring in 2028. Daraja gives Safaricom its own bandwidth muscle, reducing reliance on third parties and, potentially, lowering costs for end users.
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Meanwhile, Big Tech is on a subsea shopping spree. Meta is already building out massive cable systems elsewhere (Project Waterworth being one example), while Google is busy threading Africa into its global network. Facebook’s stake in Daraja keeps it in the game, particularly in Kenya, where the platform remains the undisputed king of social media.
And the timing couldn’t be more interesting. Safaricom faces new competition from Starlink’s satellite internet, while Airtel is also activating its own subsea cable routes. With Kenya’s government pushing digitisation and rural connectivity, bandwidth wars are heating up. And Daraja might just tilt the scales.
Undersea cables are the unsung heroes of the internet, carrying over 95% of global traffic. Without them, that late-night Facebook scroll or your 8am Zoom meeting simply wouldn’t happen. With 24 fibre pairs, Daraja is built for scale, resilience, and a Kenya where “buffering” might finally be a word of the past.
So, yes, Facebook is officially going under the sea with Safaricom. And if everything goes to plan, by 2026, Kenya’s internet experience could be faster, cheaper, and a whole lot more reliable.
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