President Uhuru Kenyatta sneaked back into the country on the morning of Sunday, September 29, after what appeared to be a dramatic trip in the United States.
According to The Standard, very few, officials from the state went to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport to receive him when he landed at around 10:30 AM.
The president had left the country on Wednesday, September 18, for Singapore before heading to the US to attend the 74th United Nations General Assembly.
In Singapore, Uhuru attended a meeting that focused on business, finance and geopolitics which brought together governments and private sector around the world.
It was in US, however, where the drama began with the most notable being between him and Somalian President Mohamed Farmajo, over the contested maritime.
In an earlier report by kenyagist.com, the two presidents had agreed to normalise ties without any effect on the maritime border case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
On Thursday, September 26, Farmajo, used his inaugural United Nations speech to dismiss the call for talks with Kenya over the maritime row.
Farmajo stated that the matter was in court and that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) should be the ultimate arbiter because talks between the two countries had collapsed.
That was despite Uhuru’s willingness to engage in other dispute resolution mechanisms, emphasising on dialogue.
Somalia had filed the boundary delimitation dispute on August 28, 2014, staking a claim on an estimated 62,000 square miles oil-rich triangle in the Indian Ocean.
Somalia wanted the sea border extended along the land border, a plea which if granted threatened to limit Kenya’s access to its Indian Ocean shore, technically rendering the country landlocked.
The border dispute between the two countries also threatened to hamper efforts in the continuing construction of a border wall, the fight against piracy, as well as against Al Shabaab.
The border brawl resulted in several back and forths causing various ugly occurrences.
On May 12, 2019, the Kenyan Government suspended all direct flights from Somalia into the country citing security concerns.
Director of the KCAA, Captain Gilbert Kibe, affirmed to the BBC that visitors from Somali’s capital Mogadishu or any other part of the war-torn country would no longer be able to fly directly to the Kenyan Capital.
Later on, the diplomatic row between the two countries took a nosedive after three top officials from the war-ravaged nation were denied entry at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA).
During the trip, the president was also drumming for support in Kenya’s quest to have one of the non-permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council scheduled for June next year.
Source: kenyagist.COM
