KAA bosses fired over JKIA blackout following nationwide power outage
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KAA bosses Alex Gitari, and engineering manager, Fred Odawo fired after an embarrassing JKIA blackout after a nationwide power outage
KAA bosses Alex Gitari, and engineering manager, Fred Odawo fired after an embarrassing JKIA blackout after a nationwide power outage.
Following a widespread blackout that resulted in an embarrassing power outage at East Africa’s busiest hub, Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), Transport Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen announced on Saturday that the contracts of Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) managing director Alex Gitari and Fred Odawo, the engineering general manager, had been terminated.
Mr Henry Ogoye, currently serving as the Head of Corporate Planning, has been appointed to be the Acting Managing Director of KAA in Mr Gitari’s place.
Eng. Samuel Mwochache has been appointed in an acting capacity as the General Manager, Engineering.
CS Murkomen noted that the termination of contracts was “by mutual consent.”
In addition, the Transport CS moved JKIA airports manager Alex Gogo to Moi International Airport, Mombasa, replacing Peter Wafula, who now moves to Kisumu International Airport.
Ms. Selina Gor, the Airport Manager at Kisumu International Airport has been moved to JKIA.
The power outage affected Terminal 1A, the biggest and “the jewel” of this busy hub, Mr Murkomen said.
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The control tower and the runways, he insisted, were not affected.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the incident though regrettable did not pose any danger to our incoming and outgoing flights and passengers
considering that the backup generator lighting the runway and control tower was seamlessly deployed when the blackout occurred and at no time did we have an iota of darkness on the runway and the tower,” he said.
The incident was unacceptable, according to the CS who said “we should have prepared for this, and we are not allowed to give any excuses.”
According to Mr. Murkomen, KAA has since started the process of hiring permanent employees to fill these roles.
The process will be concluded within the next two weeks.
“In order to ensure that a similar incident is not replicated, it has been decided that the two generators that were procured more than two years ago be immediately commissioned,” said Mr Murkomen.
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