Flights have now resumed after they were grounded on Wednesday at Nairobi’s international airport due to workers strike.
Aviation workers had been agitating over working conditions with riot police firing teargas to disperse them.
Thousands of passengers were stranded for hours with officials from the Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) asking them to avoid the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport until further notice.
The Jomo Kenyatta International Airport is one of the busiest in East Africa.
A statement from Kenya Airways said it “regrettably wishes to inform its customers and the general public that due to the illegal strike by Kenya Aviation Workers Union (KUWA), the airline will be experiencing disruptions in normal flight operations.”
But the airline has now said that the crisis is over and flights have resumed.
Passengers to Mumbai going through the check in process. Flights to Amsterdam and London also scheduled to depart at 10:45hrs and 11:06hrs respectively.@CAA_Kenya @KenyaAirports pic.twitter.com/RL7W7flcV7
— Kenya Airways (@KenyaAirways) March 6, 2019
Government’s intervention
Kenya’s Transport Minister James Macharia told journalists that the striking workers were concerned about losing their jobs.
He said “What they were fearing is that the proposed merger between KQ and KAA will result in job losses but we gave assurances that that will not happen.
So this (strike) is completely uncalled for because the deal has not happened.”
#UPDATE: Transport CS James Macharia says the strike by aviation workers is illegal and normalcy at the airport will resume shortly. #JKIA pic.twitter.com/uPZDEY6eYF
— NTV Kenya (@ntvkenya) March 6, 2019
Macharia later said in a tweet that the issue has been resolved to enable flights resume operations.
I am pleased to announce that the issues that we had at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport that resulted in the disruption of operations this morning have been resolved and we expect that the first flight to take off in the next hour or so. #JKIA
— CS James Macharia, EGH (@JamesMacharia_) March 6, 2019
Source: Africafeeds.com
