The Government has formally made a protest to a Dutch Airline following a "false claim" on the state of the country.
In a show of reproof, Transport cabinet secretary Kipchumba Murkomen has termed the alleged civil unrest as not only unfounded, false, and insensitive but also misleading.
"I have spoken to Dutch Airline KLM’s Country Representative to Kenya about a false claim posted on their social media on the purported civil unrest in Kenya," Murkomen said in a statement Saturday afternoon.
Kenya and Netherlands, he stated, enjoy good diplomatic relations hence the statement paints the country in bad taste.
"We are shocked that the airline would spread such fabricated, malicious and false allegations without fact-checking and considering the probable effects to our country’s image and economy," he said.
He pointed out that while the Airline has since pulled down the alert from its pages, they intend to escalate the discussion through diplomatic channels to stop its recurrence.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also come out to denounce the alert.
"Fake news," Principal Secretary Korir Singo'ei said in a tweet in which he tagged the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Embassy of Netherlands in Nairobi and the KLM company.
The response by the government comes after an outrage from a section of Kenyans who questioned the motive behind it.
"Civil unrest in Kenya and Tanzania? You are even cancelling flights...What unrest are you talking about? Well, you got alot of explaining to do," Mohammed Hersi said.
A quick check on the KLM's alerts and rebookings shows that flights to Tanzania have been cancelled over an alleged local threat.
"Due to local threat in Tanzania from Friday 27 January up to and including Monday 30 January 2023, some of our flights to, from or via Dar-es-Salaam (DAR), Kilimanjaro (JRO) and Zanzibar (ZNZ) may be disrupted. We are doing our very best to help you on your way again," read the notice.
The Dutch Embassy has also added its voice saying, "No travel warning for Kenya has been issued by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Kenya. For more information on KLM flights, please check the KLM website."
