Alarm bells swept across the Somali peninsula after two individuals tested positive for COVID19, commonly referred to as the coronavirus. Both individuals tested positive for the illness in the occupied NFD region.
The colonial governor Ali Roba confirmed the findings, while addressing the press mid afternoon. It’s been revealed that both suspects traveled from Nairobi on the 1st of April and spent a night at leheley district near the city of Wajir in the Kenyan occupied Somali region.
The suspects reportedly spent the night between Leheley and Wajir before heading to Mandera. Upon arriving in Mandera, both individuals showed symptoms of Coronavirus and where immediately quarantined.
Later it was revealed that both suspects tested positive for the illness. The identities of these individuals have not been disclosed yet but it’s widely believed there non Somalis.
The colonial governor Ali Roba said health officials will begin mass testing of residents across Mandera and its periphery as a result of those two individuals testing positive for COVID19.
Public backlash is intensifying in the area following the recent discovery of coronavirus in the occupied Northern Frontier District (NFD). A region nearly exclusively inhabited by Somalis remains destitute and cut off from the health care system in Kenya proper to say the least. Therefore the spread of COVID19 in such a place can produce disastrous consequences.
The city of Mandera itself sits on the colonial border adjacent to Beled Xaawo in mainland Somalia. Both communities routinely intermingle and engage in cross border trade and other other similar activities. Henceforth this creates an environment for which the disease can spread like wildfire effecting communities in the border region.
Authorities in Nairobi are yet to address, let alone tackle the spread of COVID19 in the occupied NFD region. A place where consecutive governments in Nairobi have viewed as a thorn in the side of there foot for generations, will more than likely go neglected once again.
Halgan Media Service Desk
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