http://mg.co.za/article/2014-04-03-kenyas-war-on-terror-is-east-africas-nightmare-waiting-to-happen
Kenya's war on terror is east Africa's looming nightmare 03 Apr 2014 16:57
M&G Correspondent
Kenya's crackdown on Muslim militants may only worsen the problem, with the
use of alleged extra-judicial measures only fueling the fire.
On the evening of April 1 a black car slowed down in front of the law
courts at Shanzu, some 15km north of Kenya's coastal tourist city of
Mombasa. Its occupants in the still-moving car emptied their guns at a
party of five men who were walking just outside the courtyard.
Once the dust and screams cleared, radical Muslim preacher Abubakar Shariff
Ahmed lay dead in a pool of blood, felled by bullets to his head and torso.
His 20-year companion was also killed, while the other three survived.
In truth, few Kenyans bar his supporters will admit to a sense of
schadenfraude at the demise of the former grave-digger known as Makaburi
(Kiswahili for grave). The fiery cleric had been a hugely divisive figure,
especially after media interviews in which he said the Westgate mall
terrorist attack in Nairobi last September was justified.
He was avowedly pro-al-Shabab, the al-Qaeda-allied Somalia insurgent group
that claimed responsibility for the Westgate horror that left 67 dead and
which is fighting to topple the fledgling Mogadishu government.
The United Nations Security Council in August 2012 put him on a sanctions
list including an assets freeze and a travel ban following a report that
identified him as "a leading facilitator and recruiter of young Kenyan
Muslims for violent militant activity in Somalia."
Essentially, Shariff was a dead man walking and he foretold his death. "I
will be killed anytime and would be happy to die as a martyr. I am the only
remaining one [yet] to die like Sheikh Aboud Rogo. People have been asking
why it is not happening to me," he once told a reporter.
Unexplained deaths
Shariff's killing was the latest instalment in a series of unexplained
deaths that have befallen prominent Muslim clerics claimed to be
radicalising youths in Mombasa, where the majority of Kenya's Muslims live,
as the east African country wages a war on terror.
In August 2012, Sheikh Aboud Rogo Mohammed was gunned down in another
drive-by shooting on a lonely stretch of road as he drove his wife and two
daughters to hospital, leading to riots in the city.
His successor as imam at the controversial Musa mosque (which supporters
renamed Martyr's mosque], Sheikh Ibrahim Ismail, also met the same fate in
October last year, again sparking deadly riots.
Authorities claim the Musa mosque is a recruitment and indoctrination
centre for al-Shabab fighters. In February, Kenyan security forces stormed
the mosque to scuttle what they said was a "jihadist convention" underway.
A flag of the militant Somali movement al-Shabab was raised as scores of
youths were rounded up in the operation that saw two policemen stabbed.
Shariff termed the police action "illegal", arguing that no one would
recruit in the open at a mosque full of undercover policemen.
Makaburi is long buried, interred at midnight barely five hours after his
shooting in his bloodstained clothing in what supporters said was signified
martyrdom. However, his shooting threatens to further inflame religious
tensions in a country whose faiths have for decades co-existed harmoniously.
Messages to maintain calm were broadcast on radios overnight, while imams
also kept up the refrain. The city has so far been calm, but many fear this
belies the growing tensions in Mombasa.
Shariff's killing came a week after attackers shot dead six worshippers at
a church in Mombasa's Likoni area. A few days earlier a vehicle laden with
pipe bombs and grenades had been intercepted reportedly on its way to a
suicide mission.
Its target was said by investigators to have been a ferry that thousands of
locals use to cross the Likoni water channel every morning. A day before
the cleric's death six people had been killed in grenade attacks on two
eateries in the Nairobi suburb of Eastleigh, which is predominantly
populated by Somalis.
Fledgling government
Following heavy criticism over the rising insecurity, there is concern that
the country's year-old government, desperate to be seen as in control, has
now resorted to extra-judicial measures.
"We demand justice for the victims," Mombasa Senator and former rights
activist Omar Hassan said on Wednesday while speaking in the country's
upper house. "Speedy investigations into these unresolved murders must be
done," he said, while also appealing for calm in this "trying time."
The country's tranquillity is being sorely tested, although the terror
attacks have so far failed to spark major religious clashes.
However, Muslims are increasingly being profiled by both civilians and
security forces. "The systematic profiling of Muslim youths must end," Mr
Joho, a Muslim, said.
Further alarm is stoked by conflicting messages about a shoot-to-kill order
in the region allegedly issued by one of their own.
Following a spate of crossborder attacks claimed by the Shabab, Kenya in
October 2011 sent its military into Somalia. Kenya, whose forces have since
rehatted under the African Union's Mission in Somalia (Amisom), maintains
it will only leave once the terror group has been neutralised.
The insurgents and their supporters have used the Kenyan presence in Somali
to justify current terror attacks.
Analysts say the brutal crackdown may instead aid terrorism, which has
become a key security challenge for the nation of 41-million since a 1998
terrorist attack on the US embassy in the capital Nairobi left over 200
dead.
"These kind of killings are not helping. They are only fanning hatred and
resistance. Government should find ways of stopping the reckless killings,"
Sheikh Mohammad Dor, chair of the Council of Imams and Preachers of Kenya,
said Wednesday.
Top officials are now talking of bringing new legislation for a unified
unit to tackle terror in a tacit admission that current institutions are
struggling to cope.
Many argue that the Kenyan government should instead look at the factors
that have made the terrorism message so appealing to youths.
"Our advice to the government is that you shall not use guns, the use of a
gun shall not solve that problem. You cannot fight an ideology with the
gun. You can win this war only through discussion, awareness," Sheikh Ngao
M Ngao Juma, the chairperson of the Kenya Muslims National Advisory
Council, told news agency Agence France-Press.
Discontent
The coastal region struggles with poverty and has seen its leaders claim
historical injustices when it comes to allocation of resources, despite
being home to a bustling tourism industry that is now under threat, and a
port that serves the hinterland of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan and
the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Radical preachers easily tap into discontent at the lack of jobs, with
al-Shabab recruits said to be on better wages than they would make back home
A separatist movement, the Mombasa Republican Council (MRC) was put down
brutally. MRC leaders had demanded secession, citing resource and political
marginalisation.
However, there is a new argument that the attacks are coming from youths
wrongly indoctrinated on the virtues of jihad. Shariff's brand of ideology
has been criticised as corrupt, with a danger that it could become
mainstream.
As such, his death will only disrupt his network, but his extremist
preachings will outlast him. Sheikh Ngao is on record saying that the word
"jihad" means "striving", and of the over 30 shades of interpretation only
one calls for a rise to arms.
It is a message that has so far fallen on deaf ears for recruits and their
masters, who see the al-Shabab brand as the "real" Islam, portending more
ill for Kenya's inter-religious harmony.
Received on Thu Apr 03 2014 - 12:35:20 EDT