INTERCONTINENTAL HOTEL NAIROBI ACCUSED OF RACISM

Hotel Intercontinental, Nairobi
By Mdadisi Mmoja


A five star hotel has been accused by a client of racism. Hotel Intercontinental, Nairobi is said to have thrown out an invited guest who was attending a seminar organized by the Swedish Embassy in conjunction with the Committee on the Implementation of the Constitution. It all played out on Monday this week at a constitutional seminar. This case is not the only one to have occurred at this hotel, and is not isolated to this hotel. It is an emerging trend of hotels in Nairobi instructing private security officers to embarrass and harass some Kenyans who attend events held at their establishments.
In most cases, the victim told the weekly vision, these rude private security guards, outsourced from various security firms and with firm instructions from the hotel management will harass and give lame excuses that organizers have complained to them about uninvited guest attending their events.
The security guards go beyond their mandate by acting as both the complainant, prosecutor and judge. It is unwise, crude and dehumanizing to eject someone in the middle of a meeting just because the security personnel feel the attendant forgot his/her invitation card.
As we all know, the hotel establishment has got the right to admission; it is shameful however, and creates mental anguish for one to be shown the door in the middle of a meeting. Ironically, with the passing of the new constitution, Kenyans did away with this kind of colonial mindset now being introduced through the back door by certain establishments in town. The color of ones skin, mode of dressing should never be an impediment to ones right to enjoy his/her freedom.
In order to justify their actions, the hotel management slapped an unrealistic lunch and tea bill on the hapless Kenyan who was attending this event. The askaris used threats and intimidated that he must pay up or else “you will be held hostage and detained"
After participating in seminar for the whole day, someone approached me claiming the organizers (Embassy of Sweden) have denied neither inviting nor registering me for the seminar. It was a lie, because apart from the invitation by email that I had gotten, it was also an open forum for interested Kenyans to attend. After all this harassment I was asked to pay 1,600/= for morning teas and 2000/= for lunch.
My attempts to notify the organizer were rebuffed by the management.


21st September 2011 1.31 pm Nairobi


We once again re-visit the saga at the five star Intercontinental Hotel in which we had earlier reported of how a guest had been held hostage by the hotel's security team until when he parted with money to facilitate his release.We have been given a mobile phone number 0723133822, M-pesa transaction ID number BM73PV625 to which the guest sent a deposit. It is not clear at the moment if the hotel management is now encouraging guest to settle bills through M-pesa and if so, the number indicated here is the official line.If not then they should carry out investigations and bring the culprit to answer for illegal detention of a guest.