Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta gave a boost to the international fight against poaching on Tuesday 3rd March 2015 by setting fire to 15 tonnes of elephant ivory tusks during a ceremony at the Nairobi National Park.
Kenyatta would be the 3rd Kenyan leader to ceremoniously ignite ivory tusks seized from poachers. In July 1989, former President Daniel Arap Moi burnt 12 tonnes of ivory during a similar event in Nairobi. In 2002, the immediate former President Mwai Kibaki also hosted an event in Nairobi where he set fire to 5 tonnes of elephant ivory which had been confiscated in Singapore after it had been established that they were smuggled from Zambia and Malawi.
The inferno of the tusks will burn for 5 days under armed 24-hour surveillance, reducing the tower of ivory to ashes.