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Uhuru bans sports, attends rallying event


President Uhuru Kenyatta has appeared to break his own Covid-19 containment measures by gracing the ARC Equator Rally in Naivasha.

The move by the Head of State to grace this event comes three weeks after he announced a blanket and indefinite ban on all sports activities in the country.

At the time, President Kenyatta justified the ban, which has left thousands of athletes without a source of income, by indicating it as one of the ways of curbing the spread of Covid-19 in the country.

But then the President appeared to be reading from a different script come Saturday.

“On his way from the NYS pass-out in Gilgil, President Kenyatta made a brief stopover at Soysambu Conservancy in Naivasha where he joined motorsport stakeholders led by Sports Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed at one of the competitive stages of the ongoing ARC Equator Rally,” a statement on State House Kenya’s Facebook page explained.

“The motorsport event, which has attracted 33 drivers among them State House Chief of Staff Nzioka Waita, is being held as a test run for the 2021 WRC Safari Rally scheduled for June.”

In some of the pictures that accompanied this statement, President Kenyatta, donning a black suit, white shirt, and red hat, was spotted following the racing alongside Mohamed and Sports PS Joe Okudo.

No fans were allowed at the event, but a number of Kenyans on social media wondered which criteria was used to allow this sporting event while thousands of athletes have been stopped and threatened with arrests for training.

“Why these double standards Mr. President? No sporting activities were your orders and here you are attending a safari rally?” posed one Kenyan in the comments section.

“Which sports activities did the president ban during his most recent state of the nation address?” another asked?”

“Our President is leading the nation on breaking the same rules he made,” wrote another.

President Kenyatta appearance at the event also days after Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe dashed hopes of the resumption of sports activities in the near future.

“There is a lot of pressure on the government to open some sectors, but we must be led by science and facts rather than just feelings,” he said.

Nairobi News could not immediately establish if this event had been provided with a special clearance by government to go ahead.