Nairobi becomes first African city to host World Athletics Championships

The championships, first held in Helsinki in 1983, have never been staged in Africa, whose athletes have helped shape the sport's history, and Kenya is the second most successful nation in the event's history. Kipchoge Keino, whose 1,500-metre triumph at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics helped establish Kenya as a distance-running power, told Al Jazeera it was "a deeply special moment" to see his country prepare to host, and "a testament to how far our country has come from sending athletes abroad to compete, to welcoming the world to our own home."

Kenya's three-year campaign highlighted the ongoing renovation of Kasarani stadium ahead of the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations, as well as the country's experience hosting the 2017 World U18 and 2021 World U20 Championships, and drew lessons from an unsuccessful bid for the 2025 event, awarded to Tokyo. World Athletics president Sebastian Coe, who said the council had received four strong bids, described Nairobi's proposal as "compelling and emotional" and said Nairobi and Munich "ultimately presented two compelling propositions."

The announcement was quickly followed by questions over doping. Figures reported after the decision show 318 Kenyan athletes have been sanctioned for anti-doping rule violations since the Athletics Integrity Unit was established in 2017, with 136 still serving bans. The World Anti-Doping Agency found Kenya's anti-doping agency non-compliant with the global code in 2025; Kenya was removed from the compliance watchlist in 2026 after corrective measures. Recent bans on marathon world-record holder Ruth Chepngetich and former half-marathon world-record holder Kibiwott Kandie have kept the issue in the spotlight. Athletics Kenya declined to comment on the decision.

Kenyan MP Dan Wanyama, who chairs the committee on sports and culture, said the country has the experience and infrastructure to host the event. "It is a thing of pride for us to defeat major global cities London, Munich and Rome," he told Al Jazeera, and preparations at the Moi International Sports Stadium, known locally as Kasarani, have "started in earnest." Athletics fan Winston Omondi said some criticism unfairly focused on Kenya: "If it was about doping, then there are so many developed countries that should not even be participating in athletics, including London itself."

Hosting will require more than a stadium. Nairobi must ensure training and warm-up facilities, transport links, accommodation and reliable systems for security, accreditation, broadcasting, medical care and the movement of thousands of athletes, officials, journalists and spectators, with the city's traffic congestion and public transport network set to come under scrutiny. As Omondi put it: "We have come so far as people, as a country and as a continent for us to be judged in this way."