Kenya lockdown as Obama comes to talk security, trade

In 2011 Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta was accused of stoking ethnic violence after Kenya’s 2007 presidential election and was indicted by the worldwide Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

More than 40 sub-Saharan countries are eligible for trade benefits under the law, through which most imports from Africa enter the United States duty free.

Obama has said he had “never truly known” his father, who was born in Kenya’s far west, in a village near the equator and the shores of Lake Victoria.

Susan Rice, Obama’s national security adviser, said “there is nothing unique” about Obama’s visit to Africa. He is expected to meet with the prime minister and address the African Union, which is headquartered in Addis Ababa.

The protest was to be held on Wednesday, one day ahead of President Obama’s visit to the African nation. Jeff Flake, the lone Republican.

CNN has since changed the headline from “Obama’s trip to a terror hotbed” to “Obama’s trip raises security concerns”. Flake is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on Africa and has supported Obama’s policies on immigration and re-engagement with Cuba.

On the return flight to the United States, a second group of 10 Democratic representatives will join Obama, the White House said.

President Barack Obama boards Air Force One for a trip to Kenya and… Owing to our proximity to Somalia, a country that has been used by global terrorist networks and agents to recruit, train and plan attacks against Kenya and the region, we have suffered terror attacks.

Away from human rights and security, there is also the issue of trade.

Without revealing the number of visitors who booked to their hotels and lodges, a section of hotel managers had expressed their happy hours of seeing their accommodation facilities fully booked, thanks to Obama’s visit to Kenya.

He is also due to visit Ethiopia, with business meetings very much the focus. “Schools and banks were closed in anticipation of major traffic jams and #Obamareturns” was trending on Twitter in Nairobi.

Arriving on Thursday, Obama will be attending the Global Entrepreneurship Summit in Kenya for three-days, which seems like ample time for him to at least make a passing reference to “Modern Family”.

“We recognize the fact that as the most protected individual in the world, there will be some security measures undertaken by his team which could include the temporary disruption of mobile signals close to where the President is at any given time”, Safaricom said.

In April, it killed 148 people at a university in the north and in 2013, at least 67 people died when the al-Qaeda-linked group attacked Westgate shopping centre in Nairobi.

The company will also provide 50 workstations for U.S. government employees, breakout rooms, workshop space, WiFi, on-site catering for 1,500 attendees, and prayer rooms.

Several families from Kenya had traveled to Arusha and Kilimanjaro, coming in for a weekend vacation, and also to pave the way for President Obama’s busy schedule in Nairobi, sources told eTN.

It turns out there a lot of them all around the country, says Matt Danzico, who is part of the BBC’s “pop up” bureau of journalists, a sort of traveling news bureau that is now embedded in Kenya.