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Curfew and alcool, Kenya has to decide

One week to see how to extend or remove

24-08-2020 by Freddie del Curatolo

A new decision to be taken, sectors of the economy to be favoured or penalised, categories of workers to be put in further difficulty or to breathe again, health situation to risk compromising or continue to contain.
At the end of this week, Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta is once again called upon to speak out on the restrictions that have been in place in the country for five months because of the pandemic emergency.
After reopening part of the economic activities and the borders of 5 national counties last July, public offices, churches and national flights and finally in August reopening the international borders but banning the public supply of alcohol, a further step is now expected to bring Kenya back to normal.
The brake, as has always happened in recent months, is represented by the Ministry of Health which, moreover, at the end of July, had sided against the reopening of the skies to air traffic from the rest of the world and had at least tried to impose quarantine on anyone arriving in Kenyan territory.
Minister Mutahi Kagwe "lost" on several fronts because financial priorities prevailed, but received in return the "content" of the ban on alcohol and the extension of the curfew.
Now the request of most citizens and trade associations is to remove both the curfew and encourage the reopening of bars and the public sale of alcohol.
In other African countries the curfew has been postponed to midnight. This could be a temporary solution to prevent night-time gatherings and the bad habits associated with them, while at the same time revitalising the hospitality, catering and tourism sectors in general.
The absurd situation of an August in which restaurants cannot prepare dinner for their customers and hotels can only serve it in their rooms after 7 p.m. is something that according to a large part of public opinion has little to do with the containment of the Covid-19 and further undermines those who have never opposed various protocols and the protection of everyone's health.
The Ministry of the Interior would like to implement some of these rules to make their application simpler, more automatic. The big problem of these months has been enforcing the rules, not so much inventing new ones every week. The practical application of the laws in Kenya has always had to contend with the laziness and corruptibility of those called to enforce them, as well as the malpractices of a good part of the employees of the institutions.
This causes the paradoxical situation that sees restaurants, hotels and public places comply to the letter with rules that have also cost money and sacrifices, and then witness the spectacle of a people almost totally unaware of the obligation to mask and with endemic difficulties to sanitize themselves, given the conditions of always water and their habitats.
We hope that in these days the Government will reflect on the reality of the country and finally take consistent decisions that respect the world of work and those who have bet on Kenya to grow and make grow, always respecting health and (alas) global trends.  

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