On December 31, 2019 — and as Kenyans prepared for a new year — a Chinese website reported the emergence of a pneumonia-like illness of “unknown cause” at the Huanan seafood market in the city of Wuhan.
Kenyans were so engrossed in the festive season and the politics surrounding the Building Bridges Initiative that the subsequent media reports were hardly noticed.
On that day, President Uhuru Kenyatta was in Mombasa promising to “make 2020 the most successful year in our nation’s history”.
Although the president had unfinished projects and initiatives, the new year was threatening to be politically turbulent.
The BBI rallies and the widening gap between him and his deputy William Ruto promised a tumultuous season whose political package included a possible referendum, a crack in the Jubilee Party and reorganisation of the government.
KQ DIRECTIVE
Wuhan was 8,900 kilometres away from Nairobi and hardly a blip registered on our society’s radar on what was happening in the Chinese city of 11 million inhabitants.
Even the World Health Organisation (WHO) office in China did not seem to have the details. “WHO does not recommend any specific measures for travellers (and) advises against the application of any travel or trade restrictions on China based on the current information available on this event,” the agency said in its communication dated January 5.
By then, there was “limited information” on what had led to the 44 reported cases, some of them traders at the Huanan seafood market.
But two days later, scientists said they had identified a new virus from the coronavirus family.
The first suspected Covid-19 case was isolated at Kenyatta National Hospital on January 28, when a student who had flown in from Wuhan started to exhibit symptoms. The unnamed student later tested negative.
It was due to this fear of a massive influx of Kenyan returnees from China that on January 31 the government banned Kenya Airways from flying to the Asian country.
WHO INTERVENES
But they did not stop the other airlines. There was also an uproar over the government’s failure to bring home stranded Kenyans.
China’s ambassador to Kenya, Wu Peng, said the students and other Kenyans in China were better off staying there.
Globally, some media outlets called it the Chinese virus and this was amplified by US President Donald Trump.
The WHO, worried that the virus was being used to stigmatise the Chinese, announced on February 11 that they had given it a new name — Covid-19.
“We had to find a name that did not refer to a geographical location, an animal, an individual or group of people, and which is also pronounceable and related to the disease,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in his briefing.
By this time, there were 42,708 confirmed cases in China, while deaths had surpassed 1,000.
While most of the deaths were in Hubei province, there were 393 cases confirmed in 24 countries, and one death.
Images of Kenyans stranded in China started appearing in local media. There was a national uproar over their fate but still there was no hope.
On February 4, former President Daniel arap Moi died at Nairobi Hospital, thus shifting the government’s attention to his State burial.
Temporarily, the threat of Covid-19 was forgotten until after his burial on February 13.
By then, according to WHO, there were 1,381 deaths in China while 505 cases had been reported in 24 countries and two deaths.
EMOTIONAL BURDEN
A cruise ship suspected to have Covid-19 patients had docked in Cambodia after it was turned away from several ports.
The Kenyan ambassador to China, Sarah Serem, asked for prayers and divine intervention. “The anxiety of bearing the emotional burden of these students cannot be described. I thought I owed my life to my God and to my children … I was wrong. Coronavirus has changed my world,” she said in a statement sent to newsrooms on February 17.
But the national focus was on succession politics. Kenyans were more concerned with the BBI rallies and a major meeting had been planned for Narok on February 22 and another on February 29 at Kinoru Stadium in Meru.
Covid-19 was not on anyone’s agenda. The only fear was whether there would be political confrontation between supporters of Orange Democratic Movement party leader Raila Odinga and those of William Ruto when the meetings planned for Eldoret and Nakuru took place.
Kenya did not have a substantive Health Cabinet secretary and was awaiting the parliamentary approval of Mr Mutahi Kagwe, who was sworn in on February 28, the same day that President Kenyatta established the National Emergency Committee on Coronavirus, which was tasked with monitoring the risk posed by the fast-spreading virus.
By now, the epicentre of the virus had shifted from China to Europe.
FOREIGN FLIGHTS
But while Kenya had stopped KQ planes from flying to China, it was ironically allowing international flights from Europe, and China Southern Airline was still bringing passengers to Nairobi.
Other airlines that were still flying from China to Kenya included Ethiopian Airlines and China Eastern. KQ operated the Nairobi-Guangzhou route via Bangkok thrice a week.
On February 27, there was a national uproar after China Southern Airlines flight CZ 6043 landed in Nairobi and a Kenya Airways employee who shared the photo on social media was suspended.
Transport Cabinet Secretary James Macharia told a joint Health Committee of the National Assembly and the Senate that the whistleblower should be jailed for breaching airport security.
“The said whistleblower: first of all he is not one. You do not blow on a 787 (Airbus) arriving at 7am. That flight was not arriving in secret; he committed an illegality as that is a security breach,” he said.
On February 28, the High Court ordered the suspension of flights from China for 10 days after three petitioners asked the court to bar travellers from China.
HOTSPOTS
But while focus was on Chinese flights, and which was now turning into xenophobia, other hotspots were emerging.
“Even if you stop flights, there are others that connect elsewhere, so it is not a solution at this point,” said Health Chief Administrative Secretary Rashid Aman.
Just as both the Covid-19 and BBI tensions were building up — the latter over the Nakuru rally — President Kenyatta on March 10 met with nine Rift Valley governors at State House and asked them to conduct the March 21 meeting peacefully without exciting ethnic tensions.
But that was not be, for on Friday, March 13, the government received confirmation of the first case of Covid-19.
Italy and Iran had now become major hotspots. Italy had, for its part, put 11 municipalities in the north under lockdown apart from supermarkets and pharmacies.
But flights from Rome, especially those operated by Ethiopian Airlines, were still flying into Kenya. Also, KQ was still flying to the US, risking the lives of its workers.
The first Covid-19-related death was reported on March 26 at Aga Khan University Hospital in Nairobi.
Engineer Maurice Namiinda, 66, who was being treated for diabetes only for doctors to note he had Covid-19, succumbed. By this time he had infected several health workers.
HERO CAPTAIN
On March 26, the same day Namiinda died, KQ Captain David Kibati lifted off from JFK International Airport with Kenyan passengers who had boarded the free flight back home.
It was the last trip before KQ stopped any further flights. He contracted the virus and died a few days later in Nairobi.
“Captain Kibati managed to evacuate many Kenyans and non-Kenyans from the United States only for him to succumb to the same disease,” Mr Kagwe, said. “He paid the ultimate price.”
A six-year-old boy succumbed to the virus at Kenyatta National Hospital. Then a ports worker. The numbers then began to climb as carelessness and refusal to quarantine started.
Mombasa and Kilifi soon became new hotspots after a deputy governor failed to isolate himself on his return from a trip to Germany. Also, priests who had escaped from Italy had mingled with congregants.
With all these, President Kenyatta announced a dusk-to-dawn curfew (7pm-5am), effective Friday, March 26, exempting only 13 groups of workers offering essential services.
Ahead of the busy Easter weekend, when travellers would have journeyed from major towns to rural areas, the president imposed a three-week ban on movement in and out of four main areas with coronavirus cases, including the capital Nairobi.
Businesses started to shut down and the economy dove into a spin. A virus that had started at a slow pace in Wuhan, more than 8,000 kilometres away, was now threatening to trigger a national crisis.