As much as I agree with you (I use telegram, send email pgp encrypted, host most of my services and files encrypted on a VPS, etc.) we both have to deal with the reality: most of the people out there use Whatsapp. The same happened at the time of Skype: we linux users insisted on pushing for a move to standard protocols, like we kinda always do, but simplicity and convenience always appeals the masses more than complicated but open and "right" technologies.
Thanks for the link.

@jordi Thank you too for the read, It is mind opening.

@J4zz I went through your steps, no luck. Exdialer can't see the contacts.
Keep in mind that I had no local contacts, I only imported them from my Google accounts where I still store them (I need to move them to my own carddav server soon). I read somewhere that Sailfish cannot expose the "cloud" contacts to the Android layer for some legal/technical reasons. Can't remember where.
This does not really explain why everything worked before the reset, and why Telegram can access them though.
I'll keep you posted.