Ride-hailing service, Bolt has lamented that its “financial losses” following the order-a-ride prank between Nigerians and South Africans.
The prank, which emerged amid ongoing rivalry between Nigeria and South Africa, forced Bolt to restrict inter-country ride requests between the two countries.
The ride-hailing company also blocked an undisclosed number of riders leading to huge financial losses and disruption of service in both countries.
Speaking on the issue, the Country Manager of Bolt, Yahaya Mohammed, said the company had launched an investigation to evaluate the financial losses recorded.
Mohammed said the company would enforce more sanctions, including restricting access to Bolt app by both Nigeria and South Africa users.
He hinted that the company might compensate drivers who suffered losses.
“What we did was to block high volume of where these orders were coming from in both Nigeria and South Africa and the second and more permanent solution was then to trace IP addresses from both countries and restrict them from ordering outside these countries.
“An investigation will be done internally and everything will be analysed on how riders have ordered; the riders will be analysed in terms of their performance and what they have done in the past few days.
“It will have to be on the in-depth analysis of the rides that were booked and kilometres that the drivers wasted and see whether there is room for compensation, but at the moment, it is something that is currently being discussed and obviously a communication will go out to drivers in the next few days.
“Going forward, we will have more restricted access, particularly for these two countries”, Mohammed said.
Speaking to Saturday PUNCH, the Communication Manager of Bolt, Femi Adeyemo, admitted that the company suffered financial losses.
“Any disruptions are taken seriously, and we work diligently to minimise their impact on both our drivers and passengers. Our focus remains on providing the best possible service across all our markets”, Adeyemo added.
The prank has worsened the complex relationship between Nigeria and South Africa.
Information gathered revealed that the prank started with a South African man using the Bolt app to book a ride in Nigeria, only to cancel it when the driver was almost at the pick-up location.
The South African man and others, in a trending video clip on X, can be seen mocking the Nigerian driver, identified as Kotoro-Ola, after they canceled the ride.
In the two-minute video, the man directed the bolt driver to pick him up at Osomba in Cross Rivers State, Nigeria.
The South African man was in the comfort of his home in his country.
The trend continued with more South Africans making bolt drivers in Nigeria to waste fuel, time and energy on the prank requests.
However, some Nigerians, who learned about the pranks on X, decided to retaliate as they ordered multiple Bolt rides, which they cancelled.
A netizen with an X handle, @dipoaina1, wrote, “They’ve packed all the Bolt and Uber drivers to one location. We are going to create the highest Traffic jam in history. Jozi and Cape Town will be worst than Lagos Monday morning traffic. After this we go for the next one. All their groceries stores and customer care networks”.
Another tweep, @ 9jaDisciple, wrote, “We may fight ourselves internally….But if any outsider thinks they can come for us, they will learn the hard way. South Africa is officially under attack”.
A user, @seuntolarin, said, “Alhamdullilah. “WE”. So you see that greatness we Nigerians fit achieve if we dey together vs South Africans. No wonder APC still plays the division game to keep Nigerians divided. Igbo vs Yoruba vs Hausa vs Bini ha te, is sponsored propaganda from APC”.
The bolt prank requests caused frustration for some drivers who took to X to lament the situation.
“I drove from Cape Town to Stellenbosch to pick up a customer only to realise it was a fake request. That’s almost 50km worth of fuel gone because of internet jokes”, a Cape Town-based driver told TechCabal, a tech news site.
Another victim of the prank with X account @Phalanndwa6, said “As a bolt driver, I’m deeply hurt by this”.
It is not the first time that South Africans and Nigerians would be engaged in a battle of superiority on social media.
Soweto-born Nigerian, Chidimma Adetshina, was recently forced to withdraw from Miss South Africa after online attacks about her family background and Nigerian heritage.
