Kenya’s Health Chief Denies Accusation Jack Ma’s Donated PPE Was Illegally Smuggled to Tanzania

A consignment of masks, testing kits and protective gear, a donation from the Chinese billionaire and Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, are unloaded from a cargo plane operated by Ethiopian airlines on March 24, 2020 after it arrived at the Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi to help enhance capacity at the COVID-19 coronavirus infection testing centres in Kenya. TONY KARUMBA / AFP

Kenya’s Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe came under fire on Monday from members of a parliamentary health committee, who demanded that he respond to allegations that the bulk of PPE donations given by the Jack Ma Foundation in March were illegally smuggled to neighboring Tanzania.

Kagwe denied the claims broadcast last Sunday night in the blockbuster documentary “#COVID19Millionaires,” by NTV investigative journalist Dennis Okari, that a stunning 75% of the masks and other safety materials were sold. “We can account with our laboratories the reagents that we got from Jack Ma and how they have been used,” he told MPs.

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by Eric Olander

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