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Kenyan sprinter Ferdinand Omanyala has defended the government over last week’s visa delay that nearly saw him miss out on the 2022 World Athletics Championship in Oregon, USA.
The 26-year-old Africa’s fastest man was granted his US Visa on July 14th and arrived in Eugene, Oregon at 2.30 am, less than three hours before his race at 4.50 am.
He left Nairobi on Thursday at 6.00 pm aboard a Qatar airlines flight that took five hours to Doha, from where he boarded another 17-hour connecting flight to Seattle, Washington. He then took another one-and-half-hour flight to Eugene.
The Ministry of Sports came under fire from Kenyans following Omanyala’s visa delay, with many blaming it for the sprinter’s travel woes.
But in a statement on Friday, Omanyala absolved the government of blame, saying that Sports Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed's intervention was instrumental in him securing the visa.
"Like I said, there is no one to blame on my VISA delay. We all as athletes went for VISA interviews to the embassy. After that I was sent supplementary questions that needed clarification. But on Thursday, a day before my race, my VISA was not out," he clarified.
"It was through Government Intervention by the Ministry of Sports and Athletics Kenya that I got my VISA. In fact, the Ministry of Sports through CS Amb. Amina were instrumental in my VISA being granted once the issue was raised."
Despite arriving late in Eugene, Omanyala overcame jetlag to qualify for the semis after finishing third in the seventh heat. He clocked 10.10 seconds behind Japan's Sani Brown (9.98 seconds) and Edward Osei-Nketia of New Zealand.
Omanyala was not lucky in the semis as he ranked fifth in a time of 10.14 seconds to bow out of the championships.
Comments
If you know the backlog on issuing US visitors visa’s, including recreational/sports visa, you won’t ask such a question! A simple google search can help answer you!
The Ministry and the Government are 2 different People. So the Government may be Off the Hook; but not the Ministry. Unless he Has been Bribed to Silence.
He is a police officer, he has to two the line and defend his employer.
🤣🤣I like this @openhavens'!he is a kiganjo product.An afande! Oath of allengence to the forces. As a cop he got it right at Kiganjo... deny,deny deny even when blood is covering your lips.He can go to hell.I don'tike him anymore and he is going to vanish from athletics.At this rate of defending GOK this time next year he will be carrying out extra judicial executions in Kondele, raiding chan'gaa dens in Kiambu,hiding bank notes from traffic bribes in his groin as they do on road blocks,clobbering Azimio follwers protesting that Ruto stole the elections and Uhuru lied to baba, etc etc.He will be having more visceral fat than muscles he has
In otherworldly Afande Omanyala just shut up and let the rotten GOK continue lying. Please don't get entangled in GOK lies.Nyamaza kijana.we love your field exploits but if you become the Kinotis,mutyembeis and DPPs of Kenya you are fucked up! Please someone tell him to keep off useless issues.We Kenyans know what transpired and that is the norm bro!
Ferdinand Omanyala does not want to bite the finger that feeds him. Smart move BROTHER. Make your money.
My question to Omanyala is, what happened that you had to rush for a VISA,when you knew way back,that the WC games began on July 15th,and you had qualified? To error is human,but surely something was out of order in this case, and needs to be fixed to avoid future problems of similar nature.