Where is my phone number?

I bought a MTN South Africa PAYG sim and asked to transfer over my Vodacom cellphone number. It took over 2 weeks for my Vodacom sim to stop working and when I inserted the new MTN sim my number was nowhere to be found. I have called the store where I made my purchase, and was told to call 173. The consultant at 173 told me it was Vodacom's fault and that I need to now purchase a new Vodacom simcard, do a SIM swap to get the number back then do the whole thing again. Why would I waste my time doing this when it was unsuccessful the first time? He couldn't even check the system to see where the error was because it was down. I would like to know why MTN cannot find my number. I have had this number for over 5 years and have lost count of how many people contact me on this number. I use it to business, social, and banking and can't even make EFT payments anymore!!!! #UltimateFail