It is reported that bar owners have now devised new tricks by turning guest houses and rooms which are usually located around the bars into party joints.
According to Mavoko Deputy County Commissioner Charles Wambugu, each lodging room hosts at least 8 people who buy alcohol and share together during the day and in the evening.
The other trick includes bush parties where a group of people organise outdoor activities which are purposely meant for drinking alcohol. The groups are made of 15 to 50 people and are mostly done on weekends.
Other people are reported to have turned to Airbnbs. These groups look for spaces in people's homes and pay between Ksh 4,000 to Ksh 10,000 per night. The groups sometimes get bigger rental holiday homes that can accommodate higher numbers of people.
The tricks are being used mostly in Nairobi, Machakos and Kajiado. The DCC said that the tricks have been observed in many other guest houses in the counties that are on lockdown.
The DCC, in the company of police officers on Monday, April 12 raided bar owners and their customers in Mlolongo and Syokimau and arrested over 300 people who were found drinking alcohol and flaunting Covid-19 regulations.
While speaking to the media, the DCC noted that upon visiting the bars, they found many vehicles parked outside but the owners were not in the said bars.
They then proceeded to the guest houses where they found people drinking alcohol in groups.
Wambugu further said that they had unveiled a surveillance team that would be observing the other alcoholic joints and anyone found breaking the rules would be arrested.
"You are only supposed to open as per the hours stipulated in the license. You are also supposed to sell take away," Wambugu warned.
He noted that these tricks had led to a rising number of drunk driving during curfew and some drivers even causing accidents as they rush to beat the curfew.
Businesses in the five counties that were locked down as one Zone by President Uhuru Kenyatta have been diminishing every day.
The entertainment sector is counting losses as their owners remain hopeless on whether the sector will ever go back to where it used to be before the pandemic began.
It is these losses that have pushed bar owners and their customers to devise new tricks that they can use to continue partying while evading the laws.
