Canada Issues Travel Advisory Against Kenya Over Frequent Power Outages, Crime

• The frequent nationwide electricity blackouts in Kenya are now a concern to not only Kenyans but the international community
• Canada wants its citizenry to reconsider travelling to Kenya, citing the routine power outages that put at risk their safety
• This comes as President William Ruto intervened and charged Energy CS Davis Chirchir to address the problem comprehensively

Kai Eli, a journalist at TUKO.co.ke, brings over three years of experience covering politics and current affairs in Kenya.

Nairobi - Canada has counselled its citizens against travelling to Kenya over the nationwide electricity blackouts that have become routine lately.

With the blackouts, crime activities thrive, why the North American nation does not want its citizens in Nairobi.

Why Canada doesn't want its citizens in Kenya

With the aftereffects of the outages spilling to the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), the Canadian government argued flight services might be difficult for its citizens to access.

“Power outages could affect your ability to purchase basic necessities and impact essential services, such as public transportation including flights, medical services, water supply, telecommunications and banking,” partly read the advisory.

This came as President William Ruto intervened to address the challenge.

The Ministry of Energy was under instruction to deal with the disruption of electricity supply.

Ruto, who chaired a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, December 13, expressed his displeasure with the outages, which he said were hurting Kenya’s investment profile.

How has William Ruto intervened to solve power outages?

The matter was deliberated on during the meeting, after which it was resolved that the transmission line system would be unbundled to reduce the impact of failures of select parts on the whole country.

The Cabinet resolved that the Bomet-Narok line would be built with €400 million, equivalent to KSh 66 billion; the aforementioned would be funded by the African Development Bank.

The line, which was funded in 2016, has not been built due to legal disputes.

Additionally, €1.2 billion, equivalent to KSh 200 billion, would be channelled to the KenGen solar power project at the Seven Forks Dam to bolster electricity supply far from the national power utility firm.

The latest blackout experienced recently was on Sunday, December 10.

In his response, CS Chirchir said he was equally ashamed of the frequent power blackouts after the third outage hit the country in a span of three months.

"We are aware that there was a power blackout yesterday, and the question we are now asking is, why so frequently? I was at JKIA, flying in from Dubai, when the power went out yesterday. It is a challenge we are ashamed of as a country, and we must address it," admitted the CS.

What caused the December 10 blackout?

Chirchir disclosed that the recent nationwide blackout was caused by an overload on the Kisumu-Muhoroni line.

The CS stated that the line, which was planned to carry 80MW, was carrying 149MW as of the time of the blackout.

"We know where the problem is. Sometimes the network trips when it's overloaded, and we are addressing those challenges (lack of investment in the network for a long time). It’s bound to happen again, but we will look at serious maintenance," he stated.

The CS revealed Kenya had taken a loan from South Korea and floated a tender for the construction of a new power line for Western Kenya.

"We have not invested much in the networks. We plan on giving out a number of networks to be built by private firms. This will ease putting pressure," he said.