24 November 2015•Update: 27 November 2015
By Magdalene Mukami
NAIROBI, Kenya
Kenyans in the capital Nairobi are in top gear concluding preparations for Pope Francis’ three-day visit to the East African nation on Wednesday this week.
Kenya will be Pope Francis' first stop during his maiden visit to Africa; he will then visit Uganda before concluding his trip in the Central African Republic.
In the streets of Nairobi laborers hired by the government were busy erecting billboards with welcoming messages for the pontiff; builders could be seen decorating the curbs of major highways while other workers watered roadside flowers and grass.
At the St. Joseph the Worker Parish in Kangemi, tailors were busy adding final touches to vestments that Pope Francis will use during his three-state African tour.
At the University of Nairobi, where the Pope will celebrate a High Mass, bulldozers were busy collecting rubble from a newly built Papal Dias where the Pope is set to worship with over 200,000 Catholic faithful.
“It is an honor to construct the dias in which Pope Francis will use to speak to thousands of Kenyans; I feel blessed and thank God for giving me this chance,” Erick Odongo a builder and a devout Catholic told Anadolu Agency.
Forty-two-year-old Mary Wairimu told Anadolu Agency that the visit by Pope Francis is very significant in that it will unite all Kenyans irrespective of their religion.
“I can’t wait to see the Pope and I will wake up very early in the morning to secure a place at the public Mass at the University of Nairobi, I am not a Catholic but the Pope is not visiting us as Catholics, but as Kenyans,” Wairimu said.
“He is admired by both non-Catholics and Catholics because he is a spiritual leader who treats all the same, with love, hope and encouragement,” she added.
The Pope’s plane – Shepherd One – will touch down at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on Wednesday evening where Pope Francis will be welcomed to Kenya by the country's leader Uhuru Kenyatta and other religious leaders.
On Thursday, the Pope will hold an inter-religious and ecumenical meeting at the Apostolic Nunciature in the Kenyan capital Nairobi, he will then celebrate the public Mass with over 200,000 people at the University of Nairobi grounds.
Later on Thursday, the Pope will visit the United Nations office in Nairobi where he will deliver a key speech on climate change ahead of the COP21 summit in Paris later this month.
On his last day in Kenya, the Pope will visit hundreds of thousands of slum dwellers in Kenya’s Kangemi area where he will eat dinner with residents; he will then meet youths at the Kasarani stadium in Nairobi before his departure for Entebbe International airport in Uganda.
-Riskiest trip
To date, the trip to Africa will be riskiest that the Pope has made since he was elected as the Roman Catholic pontiff in March 2013.
Kenya has been facing attacks from the Somali based al-Shabaab militant group since 2013.
The militants have carried out a number of attacks in Kenyan churches; their bloodiest assault was on April 2 when they killed more than 140 students at Garissa University in northern Kenya.
Kenya’s Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinett assured Kenyans that the country is ready to receive the Holy Father and his entourage.
“Security arrangements have been made and put in place right from arrival to coverage of all the routes that he will be using, the venues and the residences including providing security for the visitors who will be coming into this city,” Boinett said on Sunday.
“I once again assure those who will be attending Masses or any other event that His Holiness the Pope will be participating in,” he added.
Over 10,000 police have been deployed in the Kenyan capital to provide security.
The last visit by a pope to Kenya was in 1995.
