I have read the Country specific terms for South Africa PayPal service and I have to say its a quite limited service there. Our market is not as heavily regulated as South Africa and hopefully we shall access more services here. I also think that Kenya case was bolstered by the high profile of the mobile payment solution there (M-Pesa) which has consistently made international headlines, plus relatively low cases of fraud, a big tourism destination plus many other factors.

I am sure most will despair upon hearing you need a US account, but there are ways of getting around that without buying a 2-way ticket to US to open an account. Just apply for a virtual US bank account from Payoneer. It functions like a normal bank account, and includes a routing (ABA) number and an account number. Charges; $20 per year. Rules of eligibility are a bit stringent but worth it. Just processed the first payment and it works like heaven.

Those with foreign based accounts, maybe its high time you deactivated them.

I would like to point out that additional tools are available now for example Idd Salim’s creation Pay Zunguka (feature by @Hash).

Anyway I think we may also need not just a payment and credit facility that suits Africa but also Logistics, electronic B2B & B&C ecosystem that brings all local shops, informal economy and even the Hawala system to the electronic age and better understands the local economy instead of wholly relying on systems that don’t understand or care much about you.

A larger difficulty is drop-shipping purchases to an African destination. If I want a Dell computer for use in Sao Tome & Principe, I have to buy it in the US and carry it as excess baggage to the country personally. We need secure destination services that outside vendors can trust to deliver their products to us.
A business opportunity? I wonder if we might persuade the local management of DHL or FEDEX to negotiate directly with Dell and a few other major vendors for guaranteed service in a few major African cities; then advertise the service. Think it would generate some change?

I think you’ll find that it’s a MAJOR problem for people living IN Africa. As the author points out, PayPal is suspicious BECAUSE the author has an African mailing address. PayPal, Facebook et al are guilty of online profiling which would normally provoke an outcry in the real world.

Kenya was the first country in the world to adopt M-Pesa and the success of it there meant it has been adopted in other African countries and beyond. Infact as this article shows, http://allafrica.com/stories/201007020876.html, the US is considering it too.

If PayPal and Facebook make it difficult for African residents to use their services, then homegrown alternatives should be considered – in China, Baidu is the biggest search engine not Google. Likewise in Brazil, Orkut is the biggest social networking site and not Facebook.