Government emergency texts will now reach you even if you blocked promotional messages. The Communications Authority (CA), Kenya’s telecoms regulator, has ordered Safaricom, Airtel Kenya, Telkom Kenya and Jamii Telecommunications to deliver them to every active subscriber. The order is dated 1st October 2026, and the first test runs were set for 2nd October.
You can’t switch these texts off through your operator. The operators have been told not to apply opt-out mechanisms to the alerts, so the block you set on promotional messages does nothing to them. On Safaricom that block sits in the *456# menu, under Stop, then Marketing Messages. The order also tells operators to deliver the alerts despite Do Not Disturb (DND) settings, which are another block on marketing texts. The CA has exempted “Government-authorized emergency bulk SMS communications” from the opt-in and opt-out requirements that apply to commercial messaging. Bulk SMS is one message sent to many numbers at once. The exemption names only government emergency messages, so adverts from businesses keep their opt-out.
The CA lists five kinds of message:
- early warnings,
- disaster preparedness advisories,
- simulation notifications,
- emergency instructions and
- El Niño-related public safety alerts.
They go out through designated platforms, including short code 1590, a four-digit number that texts come from instead of a full phone number. Operators must give them priority across their networks and provide technical support for the simulations and for real emergencies. The CA cites the Constitution, the Access to Information Act 2016 and Condition 6 of the operators’ licences, which requires them to give the public information as the government directs during emergencies.
The trigger is El Niño, a naturally occurring climate pattern in the tropical Pacific that influences weather around the world and has been linked to several major floods in Kenya. The Kenya Meteorological Service Authority said on 26th August 2026 that this year’s event is “strengthening further and evolving toward a very strong event”. Its outlook for October to December expects above-average rainfall in most counties, Nairobi and Mombasa included, and has the rains continuing into January in many of them. The CA has not said when its preparedness and response period ends. If it follows the rains, the exemption could run into 2027.
SMS is the route for now. The CA is assessing whether Kenya is ready for cell broadcast, which sends an alert to every phone connected to the towers in an affected area, needs no registration or subscription and, the CA says, keeps delivering when networks are overloaded. At a workshop on 16th March 2026 the CA reviewed a tool for that assessment and called the national service “proposed”. Until it exists, texts carry the alerts, which is probably why the opt-outs had to give way.
The order covers nearly every mobile line in Kenya. The CA counted 88.0 million active SIM cards in June 2026, and the four operators named hold about 86.5 million of them. Those are lines, and one person can hold several. The CA counts a SIM as active if it was used at least once in the past three months. On 28th September we showed that there are 8.3 million more active SIM cards than phones on the networks, so if you carry two lines you will probably get each alert twice.
The purpose is sound. A flood warning shouldn’t be blocked by a setting meant for adverts, and the exemption is written to cover only government emergency messages. What is missing is the rest of the rules. The CA has not said when the period ends, who in government can authorise a message, or which platforms besides 1590 will be used. A channel with no subscriber opt-out needs all three.
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