Chinese exodus? Busy day at JKIA as international flights resume

Hundreds of Chinese nationals were on Friday morning spotted at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) waiting to depart Kenya.

This comes on the day the country is opening up its airspace for international flights.

Those who spoke to the Nation said they were leaving out of precaution due to the recent spike in Covid-19 cases in the country.

Many say they had earlier applied to leave the country but that the local embassy opposed the move.

Majority of those leaving at the moment are women and children, with some the men choosing to stay behind due to work obligations.

Kenya’s Covid-19 cases jumped to 19,913 on Thursday after 788 new cases were reported from a sample of 5,521.

But even as many Chinese nationals bolt out of the country, citizens of the Asian country are among those exempted from mandatory quarantine upon landing in Kenya as part of new rules issued by Transport Cabinet Secretary James Macharia.

In a statement issued on Thursday, the CS said passengers from countries with mild and limited transmission or declining number of cases will be exempted from isolation.

International flights resume on Saturday after four months of being suspended to contain the spread of Covid-19, which was first recorded in Kenya in March.

Kenya Airways, which had lost more than Sh10 billion in the six months to June due to the travel restrictions, has unveiled a flight schedule to 30 destinations.

Passengers will be required to have a negative Covid-19 certificate taken at least 96 hours before and would not exhibit coronavirus symptoms.

-Additional reporting by Gerald Andae