The activities of Kenya’s main airport, Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), were recently disrupted by a mini-strike action. The industrial action has however been resolved and activities have returned to normalcy.
James Macharia, Kenya’s Transport Minister who visited the airport earlier yesterday, reported in a tweet that the issue had been resolved and flight operations had resumed in the airport. The Kenyan National Carrier, Kenya Airways, also tweeted that all delayed flights had resumed.
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
A labor dispute had kick-started the strike action which led to all flights being grounded. Hundreds of passengers were left stranded by the action which saw riot police sweep through the airport picketing ground staff. Kenya Airways had tweeted that commuters with flights scheduled for 11 am and later shouldn’t bother coming to the airport till further information was shared.
The strike action was a result of a dispute the Kenya Aviation Workers’ Union (KAWU) had with the national airline. An earlier court injunction had suspended the planned industrial action so it wasn’t a surprise that the union’s leader, Moss Ndiema, was arrested soon after making a speech at the airport.
