Tourists seeking entry into Nairobi National Park were left stranded for hours on Sunday after the eCitizen platform, used for paying entry fees, experienced a major system failure. Frustrated visitors waited at the main gate for over two hours, with some eventually canceling their visits altogether.
The outage, widely reported on social media, highlighted the vulnerability of relying on a single digital platform for essential services. Eastleigh Voice, a prominent online account, shared updates on X (formerly Twitter), lamenting the situation: “Tourists stranded at the Nairobi National Park because the eCitizen isn’t functioning. What a shame!!!!!”




In a separate development, human rights activist Francis Gaitho took to social media to allege that the eCitizen downtime might have been intentional. According to Gaitho, a group of tech-savvy individuals mobilized to disrupt the platform in protest over alleged government actions, including the reported abduction of individuals such as Kibet Bull.
“CONFIRMED: E-Citizen is down. Kenyans of goodwill have mobilized their tech skills in a bid to compel William Ruto to release Kibet Bull and all other abductees. They are also calling for the immediate arrest of Abel Rotich and five others working on the 21st floor of Cooperative Bank House,” Gaitho posted.
While these claims remain unverified, the disruption caused significant inconvenience, not only for tourists but also for thousands of Kenyans who rely on eCitizen for accessing government services.
This incident raises concerns about the reliability and security of Kenya’s digital service platforms. Experts have called for improved contingency plans to prevent such failures from crippling critical services in the future.
As the government works to restore full functionality to the platform, affected tourists and citizens continue to voice their frustrations online. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) has yet to release an official statement addressing the disruption and whether alternative payment methods could be introduced to prevent similar incidents.

