CS Amina Mohammed dismisses claims on Barack Obama half day stay in Kenya

The government on Friday dismissed claims that US President Barack Obama would be in Kenya for only half a day.

Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed said reports that President Obama would stay in Kenya for only “eight hours” were incorrect.

“You saw the speculation in the (news)papers, but I can probably just say President Obama would not be here for only eight hours but after today’s (Friday) meeting, we will be able to announce how long he will be here,” said Ms Mohamed

She said the ministry would hold a meeting on Friday afternoon and afterwards issue a statement on Mr Obama's visit.

“The preparations are actually going on very well. We are having a meeting this afternoon and we will be able to announce the time he will be in Kenya,” she added.

Ms Mohamed was speaking on the sidelines of a retreat by foreign affairs ministers from the Great Lakes region on the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework for Democratic Republic of Congo held at DusitD2 Hotel in Nairobi.

She later posted on her Twitter page: "Who said US President Barack Obama's visit will be for 8hrs? It could be longer (3 days) or even shorter (4hrs)."

"Until we receive (the) full itinerary and programme from the US Government, whatever is circulating in the media is hearsay and speculation," she posted.

President Obama is set to come to Kenya later this month to attend the Global Entrepreneurship Summit, slated for July 22 to 24.

Several unconfirmed reports surfaced indicating how long the US president would be in Kenya.

OBAMA MOTORCADE

On Thursday, a local daily quoted anonymous sources that claimed that Mr Obama would be in the country for three days.

Last month, several blogs claimed that he was going to be in the country for only eight hours.

At the same time, the Kenya Airports Authority has said it was investigating how pictures of President Obama’s escort vehicles were taken and distributed to the media.

The KAA said it was looking for the person who took photos of the vehicles and made them public on Thursday.

“(The) KAA has noted with concern images taken at JKIA and are in circulation in the media of President Obama's motorcade. We are in consultation with the security agencies and the respective ground handling company to ascertain how the images were acquired,” said the authority on its Twitter page.

The photos of the vehicles purportedly being offloaded from a plane at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport were circulated on social media on Thursday although their source was not revealed.

The 44th US President, whose father was a Kenyan, will be in the country for the first time since he took office.