InterContinental Hotel To Close Permanently And Fire All Staff

By Soko Directory Team / Published August 4, 2020 | 11:53 am

By Nsunjo Erica

Iconic InterContinental Hotels Corporation Limited Kenya is considering finalizing all its local operations in the country, permanently close and declare all its employees redundant.

The hotel in a notice stated its intentions of declaring redundancy of all its employees within 45 days, the hotel sighted operational reasons for the plan which would end in the loss of all employment positions.

“We write to inform you that InterContinental Hotels Corporation Limited Kenya (IHCL) is for operational reasons, considering a permanent closure of InterContinental Nairobi and winding up its operations in the Republic of Kenya.” read part of the notice to individual staff members

According to the notice to individual staff members, the hotel added that as a consequence of such intended winding up, all employment positions would become redundant.

InterContinental Hotels Corporation Limited Kenya is strategically located on the backdrop of both the Parliament Buildings and KICC inside the Central Business District (CBD).

The closure of the hotel is going to render thousands of Kenyans unemployed, during these hard economic times, but according to the hotel management, permanent closure was inevitable.

The COVID-19 pandemic mostly hit hard the hotel and Aviation industry which saw the indefinite closure of several hotels and cancellation of bookings worth millions of money.

InterContinental Hotels Corporation Limited Kenya’s management did not however disclose whether its woes were linked to the COVID-19 pandemic or any other reason. Basically, the intention behind the indefinite closure has not been mentioned in the notice.

The hotel has been in operations in Kenya for over 51-year and has previously been the subject of a looming auction in early 2019 over unpaid debt. According to sources, the Government Of Kenya controls 33.8 percent of the hotel’s mother company.

In February, the Privatization Commission revived the sale of government stake in the hotel through the Tourism Finance Corporation (TFC) following previous unsuccessful offers.

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