Sports CS Rashid Echesa and the Sports ministry have said that the only role the CS played in the Pakistan girls saga was to support the Pakistanis’ application for special passes to participate in an Indian cultural festival through the issuance of a letter of no objection as part of his ministry’s mandate in promoting cultural integration.
In a statement, the ministry denied Mr Echesa was involved in the issuance of work permits to the eight Pakistanis as alleged or any involvement or association of human trafficking.
“The issuance of a letter of no objection was informed by a long standing bilateral agreement for cultural exchange between the Government of Kenya and the Government of Pakistan for cooperation and exchange in areas of art, culture and music,” the ministry said in a statement signed by the director of administration, Mr Charles Wambia.
The ministry was responding to a story published in the Saturday Nation in which a magistrate ordered that the eight, allegedly flown into the country as cultural dancers, be kept in a safe house to enable police to establish whether they were victims of human trafficking.
Senior Principal Magistrate Kennedy Cheruiyot of Milimani Law Courts, Nairobi, gave the order after being furnished with special permits issued to the eight foreign women by Mr Echesa.
Echesa, while speaking in an event in Western over the weekend stated that the immigration departed was the one to blame, since it is the one that approved the entry of the girls.
However, the eight, alongside one Indian dancer, were on Saturday evening deported for violating terms of their temporary passes that allowed them into Kenya, allegedly to promote transnational culture.
The women, all aged above 18 and suspected to have been victims of human trafficking, were arrested at a club in Parklands, and arraigned for being in the country illegally.
A statement from the Interior ministry on Saturday evening said the women had been deported for violating citizenship and migration regulations, by engaging in activities outside of what was specified in their entry documents.