IMPACT OF THE SOMALI CONFLICT ON KENYA’S SECURITY
(1990 – 2013)
JOAN WAMAHIGA
R140\23088\2013
A RESEARCH PROJECT SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL
FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF
AN ORDINARY DIPLOMA IN INTERNATIONAL STUDIES,
INSTITUTE OF DIPLOMACY AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
(IDIS),UNIVERSITY OF NAIROBI
SEPTEMBER, 2014
DECLARATION
This research project is my original work and has not been submitted for the award of a
diploma to any other university
……………………… ……..
…………………………………
Joan Wamahiga
Date
This research project has been submitted for examination with my approval as the
university supervisor
………………………….
……………………………
Mr. Martin Nguru
Date
ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank God for being with me throughout the entire period of writing this
project.
I also wish to thank my supervisor Mr. Martin Nguru for being there during the formative
stage of formulation of the topic and commencing the study. I thank my classmates and
friends for their words of encouragement and exchange of ideas which provided useful
insights at various stages of the study.
iii
DEDICATION
I dedicate this project to my mother Lucy Ndirangu for being a source of inspiration in
my life and for the great support and encouragement to me throughout my life that I can
achieve anything that I desire and for her being there for me during the research period. I
thank her.
iv
ABSTRACT
There is growing evidence that the protracted Somali conflict has escalated into security
threats to her neighbours within the Horn of Africa region. Among the many affected
neighbours of the Somali nation, Kenya is a textbook example. To this effect therefore,
this project argues that the Somali conflict has had negative impacts on the state of
security in Kenya as well as having a “domino effect” on other sectors of the Kenyan
economy.
v
ACRONYMS
ATPU
Kenyan Anti-Terror Police Unit
CBP
Customs and Border Control
CJTF-HOA-
Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa
COMESA
Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa
DoD
Department of Defense
GDP
Gross Domestic Product
IGAD
Inter-governmental Authority of Development
KDF
Kenyan Defense Forces
KRA
Kenya Revenue Authority
MSSIS
Maritime Security and Safety Information System
NFD
Northern Frontier District
NGO
Non-Governmental Organizational
UNEP
United Nation Environmental Programme
UNODC
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
UNOSOM
United Nations Operation in Somalia
UNSC
United Nations Security Council
USC
United Somali Congress
WCO
World Customs Organization
vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION ................................................................................................................ ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ................................................................................................. iii
DEDICATION ................................................................................................................... iv
ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ v
ACRONYMS ..................................................................................................................... vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS .................................................................................................. vii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY .............................................. 1
1.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Statement of the Research Problem .............................................................................. 2
1.3 Objectives of the Study ................................................................................................. 3
1.4 Justification of the Study .............................................................................................. 3
1.4.1 Policy Justification .................................................................................................. 3
1.4.2 Academic Justification ............................................................................................ 4
1.5 Literature Review.......................................................................................................... 4
1.5.1 Origin of the Somalia Conflict ................................................................................ 4
1.5.2 Kenya’s Poor State of Security due to the Somali Crisis........................................ 8
1.5.3 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 10
1.6 Theoretical Framework ............................................................................................... 10
1.7 Study Hypothesis ........................................................................................................ 11
1.8 Research Methodology ............................................................................................... 11
1.9 Scope and Limitations of Study .................................................................................. 11
1.10 Chapter Outline ......................................................................................................... 12
CHAPTER TWO: BACKGROUND OF THE STATE COLLAPSE IN SOMALIA
AND THE CORRESPONDING RISE OF INSECURITY IN KENYA .................... 13
2.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 13
2.2 Background to the State Collapse in Somalia in The 1990s ....................................... 13
2.3 Somalia – Ethiopia conflict ......................................................................................... 14
2.4 Collapse of government in Somalia ............................................................................ 15
vii
2.5 The Somali Intractable Conflict and the Corresponding Security Threats to Kenya . 17
2.6 The state of piracy in the East African Coast ............................................................. 18
2.7 Islamic insurgency in Somalia .................................................................................... 21
CHAPTER THREE: KENYA’S SECURITY EFFORTS TO CURB INSECURITY
EMANATING FROM STATE COLLAPSE IN SOMALIA ...................................... 24
3.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 24
3.2 Terrorism..................................................................................................................... 24
3.2.1 International Cooperation as a Counter-Terrorism Measure ................................ 28
3.2.2 Anti – Terrorism Legislations and Policy Actions in Kenya ................................ 33
3.3 Military Interventions by the Kenya Defense Forces (KDF)...................................... 34
3.3 Counter – Piracy Efforts in Kenya .............................................................................. 34
3.4 Effectiveness of Kenya’s Security Measures against the Security Threats Arising
from Somali State Collapse .............................................................................................. 35
CHAPTER FOUR: ANALYSIS OF DATA ................................................................. 39
4.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 39
4.2 Data Analysis .............................................................................................................. 39
4.2.1 Has The Somalia State Collapse Led To Threats To Security In Kenya? ............ 39
4.2.1 Kenya’s response to the various security threats that have been posed by the
Somali state collapse and the subsequent protracted civil war ............................. 42
CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY, RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS 45
5.1 Summary ..................................................................................................................... 45
5.2 Recommendations ....................................................................................................... 45
5.3 Conclusions ................................................................................................................. 47
REFERENCES ................................................................................................................ 48
viii
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY
1.1 Introduction
The Republic of Kenya and its citizens have witnessed great impacts of the conflict in
Somalia on its security since its inception in the late 1980s due to the resistance of Somali
armed forces to the dictatorial rule of the then leader Siad Barre and his regime. After the
armed forces finally managed to overthrow Siad Barre’s regime in 1991, the civil war in
Somalia officially begun.
The civil war which has been going on for over two decades has negatively impacted on
the Somalis as well as the Horn of Africa region adversely affecting neighboring states
that are in close proximity with Kenya itself such as Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti. This
has seen great attention and concern from the regional and international bodies and states
on the ongoing crisis.
The Republic of Somalia was founded in 1960 from a territory contained in the colony of
Italian Somaliland and the British protectorate, Somaliland. In 1969, after 9 years of
democratic government, a Somali military officer by the name Siad Barre seized
government in Somalia through a military coup and declared it a socialist state. Somalia
was initially a client state of the Soviet Union but President Siad Barre flipped allegiance
to the United States after Somalia invaded the contested Ethiopian region of Ogaden in
1977.1 The United States gave aid to Somalia despite President Siad Barre’s poor human
rights record and this also saw clan divisions within Somalia deepen under his corrupt
rule.
Clans opposed to President Barre’s rule went ahead to form armed forces which had a
similar agenda of resisting his regime. Finally, in January 1991, armed forces by the
name of United Somali Congress (USC) ousted Siad Barre from the capital Mogadishu.
After removing Barre from power, the warlord-led clan armed forces then descended
upon each other, causing intense inter-clan battles. These battles escalated into a
1
Center for American Progress, Twenty Years of Collapse and Counting p.7
1
nationwide war which saw the state of Somalia collapse into a civil war which has lasted
until now.
External responses to the conflict came late as wars in other parts of the globe for
example, the Gulf War commanded more attention from international bodies. Help
however finally came in the year1992 when a UN diplomatic engagement begun and a
ceasefire was negotiated in Mogadishu between the two major fighting factions. The
United Nations Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM) was also formed and brought into
Somalia but it was however unable to quell the violence and address the famine being
faced by the citizens.
As this research is meant to focus on the impact that the ongoing Somali conflict has had
and is still having on Kenya, the research shall concentrate more specifically on the
negative impacts on the Kenya’s state security. This is due to the fact that the conflict’s
negative impacts on the state of security in Kenya, has also had a “domino effect” on
other sectors of the Kenyan economy.
1.2 Statement of the Research Problem
Over the past two decades, Somalia has been through a constant and seemingly unending
civil war. This has seen failure of governments despite numerous attempts to set up
functioning governments charged with the responsibility to oversee quelling of the
violence and unrest and a return of peace and tranquility in the nation. This constant infighting amongst the different Somali armed forces has brought with it a collapse of the
previously peaceful state. It has also seen an overflow of both internally and externally
displaced innocent Somali citizens who are constantly fleeing their homes and country at
large due to the ongoing war.
The failed state of Somalia has been a world focus, both regionally and internationally.
This focus has largely been due to the civil war and it has seen international organizations
like the United Nations take the matter into their own hands by making several attempts
to bring back peace in the nation through actions. It has done this by coming up with
peace-keeping missions like the United Nations Mission in Somalia (UNOSOM) and
sending in peace-keeping troops into the warring country all in an attempt to stop the
2
violence and bring back peace to the nation, but with an undesired level of success as
Somalia is still engaging in war to this date. Due to the influx of refugees fleeing from
Somalia into the neighbouring countries in search of their own personal security, Kenya
has acted as one of the hosts to these refugees and this has brought with it drastic impacts
and changes to its state of security as a nation with the impacts being felt from all the
corners of the country. With this harsh reality in view, this study is being carried out with
the intention to find out what the impacts of the war in Somalia are on the status of
Kenya’s security since the year 1990.
1.3 Objectives of the Study
The main objective of this study is;

To ascertain the degree to which the protracted Somali civil war has
negatively impacted on Kenya’s security.
The specific objectives of this study are;
i.
To establish the methods which Kenya has employed to address the security crisis
caused by the Somali conflict
ii.
To determine the effects of Kenya’s response to the Somali conflict on its own
state security and that of Somalia
iii.
To explore the implications of the influx of Somali refugees on Kenya’s security
1.4 Justification of the Study
1.4.1 Policy Justification
Kenya’s social, economic and political growth and well-being today and also in future
needs stability of security which is the government’s constitutional responsibility to
provide it and also ensure its continuity. The government has in the past and current times
been grappling with the deteriorating state of its internal security as a result of external
insecurity mainly brought about by the ongoing conflict in Somalia. However, the
measures being employed so far to tackle this insecurity menace have proved to be
disappointing and at times inefficient. Achieving a lasting solution and end to this issue
of insecurity is an essential yet uphill task for Kenya’s government, but it could be
rendered meaningless within a very short period of time if the past security mishaps
3
continue to happen. In light of this, the study is meant to evaluate on the negative impacts
of the Somali conflict on Kenya’s security and its citizens as well. From the research
findings, this study will aid the government of Kenya in evaluating its policies and
approaches on tackling with the insecurity issue. This will then help it to see where there
are weaknesses in its formulations and implementation and therefore make the necessary
adjustments in order to curb this insecurity issue that it is facing.
1.4.2 Academic Justification
This research will also be an addition to the already existing literature works on the state
of Kenya’s security brought about by impacts of the Somali conflict. The findings can
then be utilized by future researchers and academicians as they carry out their own
literary works.
1.5 Literature Review
1.5.1 Origin of the Somalia Conflict
The Somali speaking peoples of the Horn of Africa have always regarded themselves as
one people and have therefore never excused the colonial powers for the balkanization of
the Somali nation into separate entities a phenomenon that led one British author, Salman
Rushdie2, opining that, “to be Somali is to be a people united by one language and
divided by maps.” It is this analogy of the Somali nation that has been the cause of one of
the most protracted conflicts in modern history especially since the collapse of
communism in 1989 that was signified by the fall of the Berlin Wall, a period dogged by
the constant threat of a no holds barred nuclear Armageddon that hang like the proverbial
swords of Damocles upon the earth.
History has it that since 1960 when the Republic of Somalia was founded, it only
experienced the functionalities of a democracy for nine years before it was taken over by
President Siad Barre through a military coup in 1969. After taking over power and
declaring Somalia to be a socialist state, President Siad Barre’s regime saw an increase in
2
Salman Rushdie was referring to the colonization of East Africa by European powers splitting the Somali
people and creating enormous havoc in the process. See Rushdie, S. (1991, July 6). Somalis are not
Ethiopians. Washington Post , p. 17
4
clan divisions and animosity against his rule. This eventually saw the clans uniting to
form armed forces with the aim of removing him from power. In the year 1991, the
armed forces going by the name United Somali Congress (USC) finally succeeded in
removing Siad Barre from power and after doing this, they took control of the capital
Mogadishu.3
The Ogaden war can be arguably said to have erupted in 1976, widespread violence
erupted in the Ogaden as Barre financed Somali guerrillas to attack Ethiopians. The
Somali government officially declared war on Ethiopia in 1977. Somalia sent thousands
of soldiers into the Ogaden and quickly captured large amounts of Ethiopian territory.
Somali forces struck so quickly that by mid-September 1977, Ethiopia conceded that
ninety percent of the Ogaden was in Somali hands. Somali weaponry primarily consisted
of Pre-1977 Soviet donations, including over two hundred and fifty medium-armour
tanks and more than three hundred armoured personal carriers.4
Somali troops attacked the major outpost of Ethiopian forces in the Ogaden at the city of
Harer, but failed to dislodge the troops from the city. The Ethiopian army regrouped, and
with the help of eleven thousand Cuban troops and Soviet aircraft and artillery,
counterattacked, driving Somali forces from many of Ogaden’s major towns and cities.
Somali forces were seriously weakened by this counterattack. In March, 1978, Somalia
recalled the national army from the Ogaden. It had lost nearly eight thousand soldiers,
three-fourths of its armoured units, and more than half of the Somali Air Force.5
Coupled by the 1987-1991 Somaliland Liberation War, the aftermath of the Ogaden War
was the collapse of the Siad Barre dictatorship in 1991. The Ogaden war has been
interpreted by some as the single most important turning point for the Siad Barre regime.
At the outset, the conflict caused a flood of mainly ethnic Somali refugees. By 1979 there
were officially one million three hundred thousand refugees in the country. More than a
3
Center for American Progress, Twenty Years of Collapse and Counting p.7
Rediker, E. (2003).The Ogaden: A Microcosm of Global Conflict. Pittsburg.
5
Ibid
4
5
half of these refugees were settled in the northern part of Somalia, where one in four of
the population was a refugee, a situation that precipitated a refugee crisis.6
This in part is due to the fact that the arrival of forced migrants intensified pressure on
limited physical resources and services, further aggravating tensions between local
inhabitants and refugees. Resentment intensified as the Issaqs were reduced to secondclass citizens in their own territory. The government’s policy of recruiting refugees into
the army also spurred on tensions. More generally the failed war wholly eroded the
credibility of the army and police, the asserted guardians of Pan-Somali nationalism.7
Other scholars have however criticized the aforementioned causes as well as analytical
approach to the state collapse in Somalia describing it as historical and not particularly
relevant to current problems, as it assumes that the social structure of the Somali society
remained intact following its integration into the world economy.8
Instead, these new breed of scholars argue that the state collapse in Somalia was as a
result of serious economic mismanagement has also played a key role and has been one
of the instrumental causes of state collapse. Since abandoning the experiment of
Scientific Socialism in 1980, the government lacked a coherent development strategy. Its
macroeconomic policy was described as erratic, inconsistent, and often moved from one
set of objectives to another, thereby confusing the domestic market. In 1990 the external
debt was US$ 1.9 billion, which was equivalent to three hundred and sixty per cent of the
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) excluding ‘frozen debt’ to some Eastern Europe
countries.9
The scholars also point out that the public sector crisis originated from massive
expenditure on defense and security services. The regime was also highly successful in
obtaining military support. Somalia was one of the most heavily militarized states in
Africa and one of the top recipients of US and Soviet military aid during the Cold War.
Moreover, more than eighty per cent of refugee aid, which in 1986 together with other
6
Ahmed, I., & Green, R. (1999). The Heritage of War and State Collapse in Somalia and Somaliland: Local
- Level Effects, External Interventions and Reconstruction. Third World Quarterly, Vol 20, No 1 , 113-127
7
Ibid
8
Ibid
9
Ibid
6
non-military aid accounted for twenty five per cent of the country’s Gross National
Product (GNP), was diverted to the army.10
The net effect of this was anarchy and lawlessness as well as competition over resources
especially the port of Kismayu after the fall of Siad Barre in 1991. The warlords, for
example, fought to control Mogadishu, Kismayu or Baidoa to access resources. Foreign
companies also fuelled the perennial conflict as they explore natural gas in disputed areas
between regions, administrations and clans. The conflict over resources is epitomized by
the conflict between the Hawiye and Darood over the control of Juba and Shabelle river
valleys. As Joseph Kioi Mbugua (2013) argues, economically, Somalia performs poorly
due to effects of the long war and resource exploitation has not only exacerbated the
conflict but also made it protracted.11
However, inter-clan wars led by clan warlords begun and eventually erupted into a fullblown countrywide civil war which saw millions of Somali citizens who were caught up
in the conflict being killed while others were turned into refugees and fled into both
neighboring and far off countries to get away from the war. The warlords have ever since
been fighting to control Mogadishu, Kismayu or Baidoa to access resources. Foreign
companies also fuelled the perennial conflict as they explore natural gas in disputed areas
between regions, administrations and clans. The conflict over resources is epitomized by
the conflict between the Hawiye and Darood over the control of Juba and Shabelle river
valleys. As Joseph Kioi Mbugua (2013) argues, economically, Somalia performs poorly
due to effects of the long war and resource exploitation has not only exacerbated the
conflict but also made it protracted.12
To this date, the conflict is yet to be resolved over two decades on. The coming up of a
solution to this crisis is a crucial part of seeing stability in the Horn of Africa region so as
to give hope and to ensure growth for the future generations of Somalia.
10
Ibid Op. Cit.
Mbugua, J. (2013). Drivers of Insecurity in Somalia: Mapping Contours of Violence. Nairobi:
International Peace Support Training Centre.
12
Ibid
11
7
1.5.2 Kenya’s Poor State of Security due to the Somali Crisis
Since the civil war in Somalia officially begun in 1991, Kenya has seen its state of
security deteriorate. This has largely been contributed due to the influx of incoming
refugees fleeing from the war-torn nation of Somalia and the great polarity of Kenya’s
borders which has seen even non- registered refugees gain access into the country. Over
the years, terrorism has become a global phenomenon and Kenya has not been spared
having experienced major attacks dating as far back as 1998. The Northern and NorthEastern regions of Kenya are most notorious for poor security due to the high number of
Somali refugees who settled mostly in these areas and some of whom have gained
citizenship status and therefore being referred to as Kenyan Somalis. Unrest in these two
regions of Kenya has largely been due to inter-clan conflicts from the Kenyan Somalis
who have settled in these areas which has caused many deaths to the people caught up in
the fighting. Apart from inter-clan fighting in the Northern and North Eastern regions,
Kenya has also witnessed and unfortunately been a victim of major terrorist attacks
within its borders and the perpetrators being terrorists from the group Al-Shabaab whose
capital base is inside Somalia and one of their aims being launching these attacks on
Kenya is intended to destabilize the country.13
Based on documented findings and revelations, a major factor that has triggered the poor
state of Kenya’s security is lack of preparedness of its security organs to counter terrorist
attacks which the terrorist group Al-Shabaab has largely maximized on. This terrorist
group also takes responsibility for terrorist attacks that occur on Kenyan territory
claiming that their reason is due to the fact that Kenya has its troops inside Somali
territory. Kenya however vows not to withdraw its troops from the troubled country and
this has seen heightened tensions between the two countries and also between the Kenyan
citizens and the Kenyan Somalis who came to settle into the country having initially been
refugees from the war-torn nation.
In specific terms, the state collapse in Somalia and the resultant anarchy created nonsecuritized spaces of terrorists. Majority of these terrorists were veterans returning from
Mujahedeen expedition in the then Soviet occupied Afghanistan resulting in the Soviet13
Institute for Development Studies, Sussex University, Third World Quarterly, Vol. 20 p.113
8
Afghan War of 1979-1988 which led to the soviet withdrawal from Afghan. The
Mujahedeen, inspired by victory in Afghanistan, the Soviet-Afghan War veterans turned
their eyes towards the West largely seen as acquiescing in the Palestinian question. These
Mujahedeen turned terrorists found safe haven in lawless Somalia.
The net effect was a spill-over of terrorist activities from Somalia into Kenya starting
with attacks on Western interests in the country. Kenya, for example, has been the
battlefield of tragic terrorist attacks on western interests twice since the year 1998; once
in 1998 when the US Embassy in down town Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, was attacked
(killing 212 people and wounding over 4000) and a second time in 2002 when an Israeliowned Paradise Hotel in Kikambala at the Kenyan Coast was bombed (killing 13) as well
as an attempted shooting down of an Israeli jetliner taking off from the Moi International
Airport.14
In addition, there has been an increase in piracy ever since the collapse of the state in
Somalia. As Wetangula (2013) argues, prior to 1990, piracy was not a major issue off the
coast of Somalia, but like most coastal nations there were irregular incidences of armed
robbery against small fishing or leisure craft that fell prey to an armed group, or ships
that foundered off the coast.15
Wetangula further argues that a more structured form of piracy began in the mid 1990’s
when some armed groups, claiming they were authorized coast guards charged with
protecting Somalia’s fishing resources, attacked vessels they claimed were fishing
illegally in their territorial waters and held them for ransom. This slowly expanded after
2000 to any vessel that sailed within or close to, Somali territorial waters. Both vessels
and crews would be held hostage and ransom demanded. Somali piracy has imposed
significant global costs, particularly on nearby economies.16
14
Laing, A. (2013, September 21). Nairobi Assault: Kenyan Terrorist Attacks Since 1980. The Telegraph.
Wetangula, J. (2013). The Effect of Somali Piracy on Kenya's Maritime Sector. Nairobi: University of
Nairobi.
16
Ibid
15
9
1.5.3 Conclusion
From the above review of literature of the Somali state collapse as well as the attendant
causes of the state collapse as propounded and expounded upon by various scholars,
analysts, conflict and security practitioners as well as other notable authorities both
within and without the domain of international relations, the study finds that the Somali
state collapse has adversely impacted on her neighbours in the Horn of Africa region in
general. In particular, it has adversely impacted negatively on Kenya’s security.
This study is however intended to delve deeper into this, and focus mainly on the
negative impacts that the war and instability in Somalia is having on Kenya’s security
and how this is having a spiraling effect on other key sectors of Kenya’s economy after
putting into consideration that the nation’s stability on its key sectors rely heavily on its
level and state of security.
1.6 Theoretical Framework
This study will be based on the liberalism theory which is also found to be one of the
main schools of the international relations theory. The core issues that the liberalism
theory seeks to address are the problems of achieving lasting peace and cooperation in
international relations and the methods that can be put into place to achieve this.17State
preferences give governments an underlying stake in the international issues that they
face, which therefore means that state preferences is a fundamental cause of state
behavior in world politics.18 Liberals look into conflicting state preferences that are
derived from hostile nationalist or political ideologies, disputes over appropriable
economic resources or exploitation of unrepresented political constituencies. For
liberalists, social pressures lead one or more “aggressor” state to possess “revisionist”
preferences that are so extreme, or risk-acceptant that other states are willing to submit.
This is a necessary condition for war.19This theory will be applied in this study to show
that Kenya’s counter-terrorism efforts towards the Somali security threat as well as
counter-piracy operations are a necessary condition as its state preference is to see that
17
J. Rawls, Political Liberalism, New York: Columbia University Press, 2005 p.56
S. Hampshire, Justice is Conflict, Princeton University Press, 2000 p.56
19
J. Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration, ed. James Tully, Indianapolis Hackett Publishers, 1983 p.102
18
10
the peace and stability of its neighbor country is achieved as this is crucial and essential
for its own. Liberalism theory also goes further to demonstrate the role of international
law in governing the behavior of states towards each other. It also shows how the values
and actions of individual states have impacts on other states’ behavior.
1.7 Study Hypothesis
i.
The Somali conflict has negatively impacted Kenya’s security.
ii.
The Somali conflict has not negatively impacted Kenya’s security.
1.8 Research Methodology
This study will be written using secondary data which will be derived from first-hand
information written by other field researchers. It shall make use of reports written by
relevant government authorities, inter-governmental organizations and also nongovernmental organizations. The literature review is from published books obtained from
the Jomo Kenyatta Memorial Library in the University of Nairobi, local and international
media interviews, publications and articles. The research will also use authentic internet
sources and journals from previous scholars and authors. The study will use all relevant
documents available from classmates, lecturers, the supervisor and also from previously
covered course content. The data collected has been analyzed for the final product of this
research project.
1.9 Scope and Limitations of Study
The study will mainly focus on the negative impacts that the Somali conflict has had on
Kenya’s security. It will work within a timeline of twenty three years that is from the year
1990 to 2013 looking at what has transpired within those years, both on the case of
Somali’s conflict and also the negative impacts this has had on Kenya’s security.
Limitations of this study major mainly on the availability of security information as some
of the published government documents on this issue are labelled as “classified” and are
therefore not available and accessible to citizens who are not within Kenya’s security
force. Time is also a limitation as the scope of study does not go beyond the year 2013
yet this is still an ongoing issue that the Kenyan government and its citizens are grappling
11
with to this day and hence there is still ongoing impacts being experienced which would
be relevant for study and also to be documented.
1.10 Chapter Outline
This research paper is arranged into five chapters. Chapter one contains the introduction
of the topic of study, the statement of the research problem, objectives of the research,
justification of the research, literature review, theoretical framework, the study
hypotheses, the methodology of the study, the scope and limitations of the study.
Secondly, chapter two focuses on the background of the state collapse in Somalia as well
as the threats of insecurity posed by the state collapse, attempts to dissect the background
of the state collapse in Somalia as well as the corresponding rise of insecurity in Kenya as
a result of the adverse effects of insecurity that have resulted in the over twenty years that
the intractable conflict in the Somali nation has been ongoing and of which form the
scope of this study.
Chapter three seeks to examine the data collected in chapter two, as well as how Kenya
has responded to the insecurity posed by the protracted civil war orchestrated and
perpetrated in the battlefields of the sick man of the Horn of Africa region; Somalia.
Chapter four analyzes the data collected in chapter three and offers a detailed analysis in
light of the study’s hypothesis as well as theoretical frameworks. The final chapter,
chapter five, contains the summary, recommendations and conclusions of the study.
12
CHAPTER TWO
BACKGROUND OF THE STATE COLLAPSE IN SOMALIA AND THE
CORRESPONDING RISE OF INSECURITY IN KENYA
2.1 Introduction
This chapter attempts to dissect the background of the state collapse in Somalia as well as
the corresponding rise of insecurity in Kenya as a result of the adverse effects of
insecurity that have resulted in the over twenty years that the intractable conflict in the
Somali nation has been ongoing and of which form the scope of this study. The chapter
first dissects and analyzes the events preceding the Somali state collapse as well as the
causes of the state collapse as propounded and expounded upon by various scholars,
analysts, conflict and security practitioners as well as other notable authorities both
within and without the domain of international relations.
2.2 Background to the State Collapse in Somalia in The 1990s
According to Walter Oyugi (2002), historically, the Somali speaking peoples of the Horn
of Africa have always regarded themselves as one people and have therefore never
excused the colonial powers for the balkanization of the Somali nation into separate
entities. It is this phenomenon that led to one British author, Salman Rushdie, opining
that, “to be Somali is to be a people united by one language and divided by maps”
(Rushdie, 1991). This balkanization factor became a source of friction and tension
between the new Republic of Somalia (that was created in 1960 after the amalgamation
of the former British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland) and her neighbours Kenya and
Ethiopia which had large populations of Somali in the Northern Frontier District (NFD)
and the Ogaden regions respectively.20
As a matter of fact, conflict based on irredentist tendencies i.e., whereby the largely
Somali populated North Eastern part of Kenya, sought to secede and rejoin the greater
Somalia had emerged on the eve of independence with the Somali of Northern Kenya
20
Oyugi, W. (2002).Conflict in Kenya: A Periodic Phenomenon. Nairobi: United Nations Public
Administration Network
13
demanding independence for their district, the Northern Frontier District, as a prelude to
unification with the Republic of Somalia, the latter having become independent in 1960.
This conflict, which assumed a political character in its formative years, developed into
open warfare between the Somali community and the newly independent republic of
Kenya in what would become famously known as the Shifta War.21
2.3 Somalia – Ethiopia conflict
Long after the standoff between the two states Somali and Kenya had been resolved than
another one erupted between the Somali state and Ethiopia over the Ogaden and Haud
regions of Ethiopia which are predominantly populated by ethnic Somalis still hoping to
one day live the greater Somali dream. Then Somali president Siad Barre’s idea of
Somali pan- nationalism eventually led to a major war over the Ogaden region with
Ethiopia in what is arguably known as the Ogaden or Ethio-Somali War, intense Cold
War rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States, and finally the collapse of
Somalia. The Ogaden war not only helped to destroy Somalia, but had brutal
repercussions in neighbouring countries as well. The Ogaden war can be arguably said to
have erupted in 1976, widespread violence erupted in the Ogaden as Barre financed
Somali guerrillas to attack Ethiopians. The Somali government officially declared war on
Ethiopia in 1977.22
Somalia sent thousands of soldiers into the Ogaden and quickly captured large amounts
of Ethiopian territory. Somali forces struck so quickly that by mid-September 1977,
Ethiopia conceded that ninety percent of the Ogaden was in Somali hands. Somali
weaponry primarily consisted of Pre-1977 Soviet donations, including over two hundred
and fifty medium-armour tanks and more than three hundred armoured personal carriers.
Somali troops attacked the major outpost of Ethiopian forces in the Ogaden at the city of
Harer, but failed to dislodge the troops from the city. The Ethiopian army regrouped, and
with the help of eleven thousand Cuban troops and Soviet aircraft and artillery, counterattacked, driving Somali forces from many of Ogaden’s major towns and cities. Somali
21
22
Ibid Op. Cit.
Rediker, E. (2003). The Ogaden: A Microcosm of Global Conflict. Pittsburg
14
forces were seriously weakened by this counterattack. In March, 1978, Somalia recalled
the national army from the Ogaden. It had lost nearly eight thousand soldiers, threefourths of its armoured units, and more than half of the Somali Air Force.23
2.4 Collapse of government in Somalia
Coupled by the 1987-1991 Somaliland Liberation War, the aftermath of the Ogaden War
was the collapse of the Siad Barre dictatorship in 1991. The Ogaden war has been
interpreted by some as the single most important turning point for the Siad Barre regime.
At the outset, the conflict caused a flood of mainly ethnic Somali refugees. By 1979 there
were officially one million three hundred thousand refugees in the country. More than a
half of these refugees were settled in the northern part of Somalia, where one in four of
the population was refugees, a situation that precipitated a refugee crisis. This in part is
due to the fact that the arrival of forced migrants intensified pressure on limited physical
resources and services, further aggravating tensions between local inhabitants and
refugees. Resentment intensified as the Issaqs were reduced to second-class citizens in
their own territory. The government’s policy of recruiting refugees into the army also
spurred on tensions. More generally the failed war wholly eroded the credibility of the
army and police, the asserted guardians of Pan-Somali nationalism.24
Other scholars have however criticized the aforementioned causes as well as analytical
approach to the state collapse in Somalia describing it as historical and not particularly
relevant to current problems, as it assumes that the social structure of the Somali society
remained intact following its integration into the world economy. Instead, these new
breed of scholars argue that the state collapse in Somalia was as a result of serious
economic mismanagement has also played a key role and has been one of the
instrumental causes of state collapse. Since abandoning the experiment of Scientific
Socialism in 1980, the government lacked a coherent development strategy. Its
23
Ibid Op. Cit.
Ahmed, I., & Green, R. (1999). The Heritage of War and State Collapse in Somalia and Somaliland:
Local - Level Effects, External Interventions and Reconstruction. Third World Quarterly, Vol 20, No 1,
113-127.
24
15
macroeconomic policy was described as erratic, inconsistent, and often moved from one
set of objectives to another, thereby confusing the domestic market. In 1990 the external
debt was US$ 1.9 billion, which was equivalent to three hundred and sixty per cent of the
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) excluding ‘frozen debt’ to some Eastern Europe
countries. The scholars also point out that the public sector crisis originated from massive
expenditure on defense and security services. The regime was also highly successful in
obtaining military support. Somalia was one of the most heavily militarized states in
Africa and one of the top recipients of US and Soviet military aid during the Cold War.
Moreover, more than eighty per cent of refugee aid, which in 1986 together with other
non-military aid accounted for twenty five per cent of the country’s Gross National
Product (GNP), was diverted to the army.25
The net effect of this was anarchy and lawlessness as well as competition over resources
especially the port of Kismayu after the fall of Siad Barre in 1991. The warlords, for
example, fought to control Mogadishu, Kismayu or Baidoa to access resources. Foreign
companies also fuelled the perennial conflict as they explore natural gas in disputed areas
between regions, administrations and clans. The conflict over resources is epitomized by
the conflict between the Hawiye and Darood over the control of Juba and Shabelle river
valleys. As Joseph Kioi Mbugua (2013) argues, economically, Somalia performs poorly
due to effects of the long war and resource exploitation has not only exacerbated the
conflict but also made it protracted.26
The fall of the Somali economy, which collapsed even before the fall of the Siad Barre
government in 1991 translated into the loss of livelihoods to millions of people, neglect
of infrastructure and breakdown of social services. There have been severe threats to food
security ever since with the most recent famine taking place in 2011. Additionally, there
has not been any large scale and long term investment in infrastructure and human
development to revitalize the Somali economy. Inequality in group development among
regions and clans has also exacerbated the conflict. More so, due to ecological
25
Ibid Op. Cit.
Mbugua, J. (2013). Drivers of Insecurity in Somalia: Mapping Contours of Violence. Nairobi:
International Peace Support Training Centre.
26
16
degradation among other factors, there has been a decline in access to water and pasture
during dry seasons in places such as Somalia.27
2.5 The Somali Intractable Conflict and the Corresponding Security Threats to
Kenya
As has been in the analogy of the state collapse in Somalia expounded upon above, the
net effect of this was anarchy and lawlessness as well as competition over resources
especially the port of Kismayu after the fall of Siad Barre in 1991. The warlords, for
example, fought to control Mogadishu, Kismayu or Baidoa to access resources. Foreign
companies also fuelled the perennial conflict as they explore natural gas in disputed areas
between regions, administrations and clans. The conflict over resources is epitomized by
the conflict between the Hawiye and Darood over the control of Juba and Shabelle river
valleys. As Joseph Kioi Mbugua (2013) argues, economically, Somalia performs poorly
due to effects of the long war and resource exploitation has not only exacerbated the
conflict but also made it protracted.28
Furthermore, as we have seen, the fall of the Somali economy, which collapsed even
before the fall of the Siad Barre government in 1991, translated into the loss of
livelihoods to millions of people, neglect of infrastructure and breakdown of social
services. There have been severe threats to food security ever since with the most recent
famine taking place in 2011. Additionally, there has not been any large scale and long
term investment in infrastructure and human development to revitalize the Somali
economy. Inequality in group development among regions and clans has also exacerbated
the conflict. More so, due to ecological degradation among other factors, there has been a
decline in access to water and pasture during dry seasons in places such as Somalia.29
Against this background, the youth in Somalia were (and have been hindered ever since)
hindered from effective participation in peace building and development due to illiteracy,
lack of economic opportunities, unemployment, breakdown of family and social ties and
27
Ibid Op. Cit.
Ibid
29
Ibid
28
17
other cultural inhibitions. For example, statistics in Somalia have shown that over seventy
per cent of the youth in Somalia are under the age of thirty. The average unemployment
rate for people aged 15 - 64 is a whooping fifty four per cent while the unemployment
rate of youth aged 15 - 29 is sixty seven per cent which in effect is one of the highest in
the world.30These youths who are gullible out of material necessity have been exploited
and used both in terrorism as well as in piracy cases since the dawn of the 1990s. In the
case of the latter, youths have increasingly been recruited into piracy activities in the
Horn of Africa posing maritime threats as well as economic threats to neighbouring
countries such as those in east and central Africa, Kenya included. With the longest
coastline in Africa and its status as a “failure among failed states,” Somalia is now the
source of sixty two per cent of all pirate attacks worldwide. The Gulf of Aden north of
Somalia is a corridor of the Suez Canal route that links the Mediterranean Sea with the
Arabian Sea. Pirate gangs have their pick among twenty thousand ships that transit the
Gulf of Aden annually, including those carrying more than ten per cent of the world’s oil
supply.31
2.6 The state of piracy in the East African Coast
The origins of piracy in the Somali high seas have been traced to the 1990s specifically in
1991 as foreign trawlers began illegally overfishing Somali waters and local fishermen
organized to protect their livelihood. The first incidents of Somali piracy were sporadic
hijackings or quasi-legal extortion of foreign vessels for fees to fish off the Somali
coast.32. Incidences of Somali piracy rose gradually from 1991 to 2005, when it took off,
and surged again in the years 2008 and 2009. Since then, pirates have pushed out from
the Gulf of Aden deep into the Indian Ocean. In the year 2010 for example, the
International Maritime Bureau attributed forty nine hijackings, sixteen boardings and one
30
United Nations Development Programme. (2012). Somalia Human Development Report 2012:
Empowering Youth for Peace and Development. Nairobi: United Nations Development Programme
31
Singh, C., & Bedi, A. (2012). ‘War on Piracy’: the Conflation of Somali Piracy with Terrorism in
Discourse, Tactic and Law. Hague: Institute of Social Studies
32
See Bahadur, J. (2011). Deadly Waters: Inside the Hidden World of Somalia’s Pirates. London: Profile.
See also Hansen, S. (2009). Piracy in the Greater Gulf of Aden: Myths, Misconceptions and Remedies.
Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research
18
hundred and fifty one attempted boardings to Somali pirates. One thousand and sixteen
seafarers were held hostage for ransom. The vast majority of these hostages were released
unharmed after ship owners delivered payment, but fourteen were reported killed.
Ransom payments to pirates in 2010 totaled US$112.79 million.33
In 2011, hijackings fell to twenty eight and hostages fell to four hundred and seventy, but
boardings rose to twenty, attempted boardings rose to 189 and crew fatalities rose to
thirty two. Despite fewer hijackings, gross pirate revenue also increased in the year 2011
to an estimated US$160 million. The average ransom payment for a vessel and her crew
today is US$5 million and rising. The highest ransom paid in 2011 was US$13.5 million
for the Greek oil tanker Irene. It is eighty per cent more expensive for ship owners to
avoid the Suez Canal and sail around the Cape of Good Hope than it is to take the risk
and pay ransom if necessary. To buffer the additional risk, they take out high-premium
insurance, streaming profits to marine insurers.34
Lauren Ploch et al. argues (2011) that, the increase in pirate attacks off the Horn of Africa
is directly linked to continuing insecurity and the absence of the rule of law in war-torn
Somalia. The absence of a functioning central government there provides freedom of
action for pirates and remains the single greatest challenge to regional security. The lack
of law enforcement capacity creates a haven where pirates hold hostages during ransom
negotiations that can last for months. Furthermore, the absence of Somali coastal security
authorities has allowed illegal international fishing and maritime dumping to go
unchecked, which in turn has undermined coastal communities’ economic prospects,
providing economic or political motivation to some pirates. The apparent motive of most
pirate groups, however, is profit, and piracy has proven to be lucrative.35
The vice has also been attributed to the social upheavals, human hardship, environmental
degradation and the entrepreneurial spirit of the Somali. Piracy is flourishing in Somalia
as it is a quick way for all involved to earn a large amount of money way beyond any
Singh, C., & Bedi, A. (2012). ‘War on Piracy’: the Conflation of Somali Piracy with Terrorism in
Discourse, Tactic and Law. Hague: Institute of Social Studies
34
Ibid
35
Ploch, L., Blanchard, C., O'Rourke, R., Mason, R., & King, R. (2011).Piracy off the Horn of Africa.
Washington, D.C: Congressional Research Service
33
19
other means of income generation. In addition to that, poverty, environmental hardship,
pitifully low incomes as well as reduction of pastoralist resources have been cited as
causative agents of increase in piracy off the Horn of Africa’s coastline.36
As Wetangula (2013) argues, the advent of piracy is impacting directly Kenya’s
economy. Part of the national budget has to be redirected on sea patrols and to matters of
defense and security as the country tries to tackle the impacts of piracy. Piracy has
affected the tourism sector in Kenya as small yachts; small chartered vessels cannot be
able to sail for fear of being captured. The net effect has been a huge effect on
employment and foreign exchange earnings from the tourist industry as some countries
such as the United States of America and Europe which have been issuing travel advisory
to their citizens planning to visit Kenya’s coastal cities and islands such as Lamu which
are considered prone to pirate attacks. Against this background, the country has been
forced to invest in new equipment’s like patrol boats, radars, computers, cameras and
evidence gathering equipment as well as enhance her defense spending thus starving
much needed cash which would have otherwise been earmarked for development.37
Somali piracy, owing to the proximity of Somalia to Kenya, greatly reduced maritime
security in Kenya owing to the fact that there was increased exploitation of maritime
spaces as well as their attendant militarization by the pirates and their subsequent use as
extractive spaces. In addition, Somali maritime piracy increased Kenya’s maritime
transport cost thus posing an economic reason for a number of reasons. First, in 2008
ship-owners had to re-route their ships to avoid dangerous waters which leads to a high
cost that has to be passed to the final consumers in the country of destination. However,
this translates into higher costs of goods on reaching the country of destination. Secondly,
based on the claim of insurers and insurance companies loaded their premiums on
maritime freights thus leading to high operational costs. Thirdly, some shipping lines
totally avoided transporting to piracy prone areas thus making goods very expensive. The
36
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2012). Counter-Piracy Programme; Support to the Trial
and Related Treatment of Piracy Suspects. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
37
Wetangula, J. (2013). The Effect of Somali Piracy on Kenya's Maritime Sector. Nairobi: University of
Nairobi.
20
study also established that Somali piracy affected import /export trade in Kenya to a very
great extent.38
2.7 Islamic insurgency in Somalia
The Islamist insurgency in Somalia has also been attributed to a spillover effect on
security in the northeast of neighbouring Kenya, affecting livelihoods and the delivery of
services, say residents and officials. Among the crimes reported in the North Eastern
region of Kenya for example include killings, car jackings and abductions including, in
2009, of aid workers and, in 2008, of two Catholic nuns. Insecurity in the borderlands has
led thousands of livestock herders to abandon their traditional grazing land, say locals.
Furthermore, dozens of community programmes have been disrupted, notably those
dealing with reproductive health, sanitation, food security and education, according to
NGOs working in the region.39
IRIN citing humanitarian workers mostly from UN agencies report that there is a direct
effect of insecurity in Somalia for the humanitarian operations in North East Kenya. One
of these effects is that Somali rebels enter Kenyan territory. Messages and threats have
been received by humanitarians about their own security from some of the Somali groups
as a result of these incursions and indigenous banditry and armed cattle rustling. The UN
classifies the region as a phase-three security zone which means no United Nations
movement can be done without armed escorts. A senior UN source working with security
concurred that insecurity in Somalia has worsened the situation in northeast Kenya. There
is no government on the other side. Nobody knows how many weapons go back and forth
across the border and that is always a concern.40
The state collapse in Somalia and the resultant anarchy created non-securitized spaces of
terrorists. Majority of these terrorists were veterans returning from Mujahedeen
38
Wetangula, J. (2013). The Effect of Somali Piracy on Kenya's Maritime Sector. Nairobi: University of
Nairobi.
39
IRIN Africa. (2010, September 17). Kenya - Somalia: Insecurity Without Borders. Retrieved June 18,
2014, from IRIN Africa: http://www.irinnews.org/report/90505/kenya-somalia-insecurity-without-borders
40
Ibid
21
expedition in the then Soviet occupied Afghanistan resulting in the Soviet-Afghan War of
1979-1988 which led to the soviet withdrawal from Afghan. The Mujahedeen, inspired
by victory in Afghanistan, the Soviet-Afghan War veterans turned their eyes towards the
West largely seen as acquiescing in the Palestinian question. These Mujahedeen turned
terrorists found safe haven in lawless Somalia.
The net effect was a spill-over of terrorist activities from Somalia into Kenya starting
with attacks on Western interests in the country. Kenya, for example, has been the
battlefield of tragic terrorist attacks on western interests twice since the year 1998; once
in 1998 when the US Embassy in down town Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, was attacked
(killing 212 people and wounding over 4000) and a second time in 2002 when an Israeliowned Paradise Hotel in Kikambala at the Kenyan Coast was bombed (killing 13) as well
as an attempted shooting down of an Israeli jetliner taking off from the Moi International
Airport.41
Since Kenyan troops entered Southern Somalia to flush out Al Shabaab terrorists in a
military operation dubbed ‘Operation Linda Nchi’, there have been a number of smallscale grenade and bomb attacks on churches, bars, bus stations, military sites and
shopping centres around Nairobi and Mombasa. The attacks started on October 24, 2011,
when a grenade was hurled into a Nairobi bar, killing one person and injuring more than
twenty. The same day, another grenade was hurled from a moving vehicle into the city's
Country Bus Terminal, killing five people. A second attack on the bus station on March
2012 left six people dead and over 60 injured.42
In June 2012, a popular bar in Mombasa was hit by a grenade attack, leaving one person
dead and several injured. The following month, there was another grenade attack on a bar
in Mombasa where patrons had gathered to watch a football match between England and
Italy. Three people were killed. In July 2012, masked gunmen stormed two churches in
Garissa, south of the Somali border, killing seventeen people including two policemen
whose guns they took. There were several grenade and bomb attacks that claimed lives in
the predominantly Somali Eastleigh area of Nairobi in the second half of 2012; one on a
41
42
Laing, A. (2013, September 21). Nairobi Assault: Kenyan Terrorist Attacks Since 1980. The Telegraph
Ibid
22
bus and several either in or close to mosques.43On Saturday Sept. 21, 2013, Al Shabaab
gunmen, in Al Shabaab’s only recorded hostage-barricade attack, stormed Westgate Mall
in the upmarket centre of Westlands, Nairobi. The attack resulted in hundreds of
casualties, including over sixty deaths in an attack that shook the world and focused
attention on terrorism in the country.44
43
Laing, A. (2013, September 21). Nairobi Assault: Kenyan Terrorist Attacks Since 1980. The Telegraph
Miller, E. (2013). Al-Shabaab Attack on Westgate Mall in Kenya. National Consortium for the Study of
Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism
44
23
CHAPTER THREE
KENYA’S SECURITY EFFORTS TO CURB INSECURITY EMANATING FROM
STATE COLLAPSE IN SOMALIA
3.1 Introduction
From refugee crises, to terrorism and to piracy in the high seas, maladies which have
affected Kenya’s internal security as well as sabotaged her economy with the adverse
effects the latter two vices have had on tourism, the country’s second greatest income
earner, and trade as well as her pivotal role in being the gateway to the more than two
hundred million east and central African population as well as being one of the key
gateways to the four hundred million strong COMESA market, Kenya can arguably be
said to have adversely suffered from Somalia’s state collapse.
The country has however employed a number of measures so as to try to arrest the rising
state of insecurity in Kenya. It is against this background that this chapter seeks to
investigate the measures in which the country has undertaken to securitize her from the
insecurities necessitated by state collapse in Somalia. The chapter also seeks to assess the
effectiveness as well as the efficiency of these methods that Kenya has employed.
3.2 Terrorism
Kenya was faced by acts of terrorism on August 7 1998, when a massive bomb exploded
outside the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, killing 213 people, among them twelve
Americans-and injuring over 4,000. Responsibility was quickly traced to al Qaeda. Four
years later, Al Qaeda operatives struck again, killing 15 people in an Israeli-owned hotel
near Mombasa, Kenya, and simultaneously firing missiles at an Israeli passenger jet
taking off from Mombasa's Moi International Airport.45 The attacks along many others
that have followed since the that were orchestrated by arguably one of the greatest terror
groups in the world, it became apparent that Kenya’s fetish attractiveness to terrorist
operatives was due to the fact that the combination of geographic, regional, historical,
45
Lyman, P., & Morrison, J. (2004).The Terrorist Threat in Africa.Foreign Affairs, Vol. 83, No. 1, 75-86.
24
political, economic and socio-cultural factors were an allure to terrorist organizations in
the Horn of Africa, the Arabian Peninsula as well as those operating in the Arab
Maghreb.46
The direct causes of terrorist attacks in Kenya were identified to be; first, its close ties
with Israel and western countries, especially the US, secondly, its vibrant coastal beach
tourism industry that threatens local Islamic culture and, and thirdly, the perception that
the country‘s predominantly Christian population is an obstacle to the Islamization of
Eastern Africa as part of the terrorists’ global agenda of establishing a global Islamic
caliphate.47
To counter terror, Kenya has employed a number of measures. First, the government
employed some of its very viable instruments of fighting terror namely; diplomacy,
military counter – terror operations, intelligence information etc. Diplomacy is the
instrument of power that builds political will and strengthens international cooperation.
Diplomatic exchanges promote counter-terrorism cooperation with friendly nations that
serve each other’s mutual interests. Transnational terrorism has no boundaries and
requires governments to reach out to their neighbors and allies to forge a multilateral
approach in the fight against the threat. Diplomacy supports the other instruments of
national power in numerous ways. For example, extradition treaties help in the
application of criminal law by facilitating the transfer of fugitive terrorist suspects.
Intelligence sharing among nations potentially discourages terrorists from operating in
those countries and facilitates the monitoring of groups operating in the region. After the
1998 US Embassy bombing, the Kenyan government fully cooperated with the US
government in intelligence sharing and in giving US investigators access to investigate
the incident. The government also helped apprehend and hand over the suspects to US
investigators to stand trial in the United States.48
46
Otiso, K. (2009). Kenya in the Crosshairs of Global Terrorism: Fighting Terrorism at the Periphery.
Kenya Studies Review Vol. 1, No. 1, 107-132.
47
Ibid
48
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
25
Apart from the United States, the Kenyan government approached the Israeli government
to obtain its assistance in rescue operations. This was followed by the dispatch of rescue
teams and intelligence agencies to help track those responsible for the attacks. In the East
African region, Kenya took center stage internationally because of what was perceived as
the terrorists’ change in operations to focus on soft targets in countries where the
phenomenon of terrorism had not yet been experienced. The Kenyan government allowed
the United States to use Kenya for logistical support as it investigated the terrorist
incident, which resulted from the perceived notion that Kenya was a victim of terrorism
because of US interests in the country, and that the United States had to play a major role
in investigating the attacks.49
However, the Kenyan government did not apply much effort to incorporating the
countries in the Horn of Africa region in a unified regional counterterrorism strategy
because of the belief that Kenya was a victim rather than a source of international
terrorism. This denial was tied to the inability to acknowledge the wider context that led
to the growth of terrorism--the erosion of the structure of governance, notably weak
intelligence capabilities and law enforcement.50
Furthermore, the government also tried to co-opt the Muslim population into the fight
against terror. This was so because the government was afraid to alienate Kenya’s
Muslims who often complained of perceived marginalization. It was feared this group
would bear the brunt of any counterterrorism efforts, since most of the terrorist suspects
were from the Muslim community. The government was in a precarious position from the
fears that there could be political risks if it engaged in a full-scale counterterrorism
campaign Effective counterterrorism measures could potentially have destabilized the
country. Despite evidence of the presence of terrorist cells and the involvement of
Kenyans in terrorist activities, the hostility toward the government’s counterterrorism
measures and diplomatic cooperation with the United States still exists especially when
49
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
50
See Khadiagala, G. (2004). Kenya: Haven or Helpless Victim of Terrorism. Retrieved June 3, 2014, from
United States Institute of Peace. Special Report 113, Terrorism in the Horn of Africa:
www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr113.html. See also Hared, A. (2005). Combating Trans-National
Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army Command and General Staff College
26
they bore the brunt of counterterrorism measures largely by the Bush administration’s
overt and indiscriminative anti-terror operations such as the banning of Muslim NGOs
upon which the Muslim communities depended on Islamic organizations for social
welfare (medical, food relief, and Islamic education) and socioeconomic support to
marginalized communities, which the Kenyan government is either incapable of or
unwilling to give.51
After the 1998 terrorists attack, the military, as an instrument of power, was not
effectively used to combat terrorism, partly because of the notion that terrorists activities
were minimal at the time, that the initial incident was more of a criminal act than a
terrorist act, and that it was an isolated incident. The reality that terrorists were using the
porous land borders and coastline to enter the country had not dawned on the
government. Also, the role of maintaining law and order had traditionally rested with the
police in Kenya. Unlike today, the military had no training to combat terrorism. These
factors might have caused the government not to employ the military for counterterrorism
efforts after the 1998 bombing. Nevertheless, the military increased surveillance along
the Kenya-Somalia border.52
Military intelligence also joined other intelligence communities in the country to assess
the threat. An information campaign is critical to any counterterrorism strategy. When
well employed, it can counter perceived marginalization among some communities by
educating the populace about the government’s plans to address the problem. After 1998,
the government was in a state of denial and did not conduct a full-fledged information
campaign to educate the public on the need to cooperate and expose terrorists within their
midst. Terrorists do not operate in a vacuum; they are part and parcel of the community.
A well-employed and effective information campaign could have helped mold the
public’s attitude and to expose foreigners. One can argue that there was a limited
51
See Barkan, J., & Cooke, J. (2001). U.S. Policy Towards Kenya in the Wake of September 11: Can
Antiterrorist Imperatives be Reconciled with Enduring U.S.Foreign Policy Goals? Retrieved July 3, 2014,
from Africa Center for Strategic Studies: www.csis.org/Africa/ANotes/ANotes0112.pdf. See also Hared, A.
(2005). Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army Command
and General Staff College
52
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
27
information campaign; however, this was limited to urban areas. In rural areas, especially
in coastal and northeastern regions where many communities have no access to print or
electronic media and where terrorists, disguising themselves as Islamic preachers,
businessmen, and teachers, can blend easily into the community, an effective information
campaign would have helped expose them. The lack of resources and the perception that
the country was a victim, rather than a source of terrorism, can also be attributed to the
failure to launch an effective information campaign.53
3.2.1 International Cooperation as a Counter-Terrorism Measure
These terrorist attacks alongside others prompted the government of Kenya to be left with
no other alternative other than to fight terror if she was to be in a position to secure her
from further aggressive activities emanating from terrorist groups and their operatives.
The first step was at the international arena where she rooted for cooperation with the
West who arguably had superior counter-terrorism weaponry, able and well trained
counter-terrorism manpower as well as superior intelligence collection machineries that
easily dwarfed the ones in use in Nairobi. Following the attacks for example, the then US
President Bill Clinton ordered for a targeted air strike of a pharmaceutical plant which
was believed to produce arms in Khartoum, the capital city of neighbouring Sudan, which
remains on the US list of state sponsors of terror and which, for a time in the 1990s, was
official host to Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.54
In addition, the succeeding US government also immensely helped Kenya’s antiterrorism operations especially through increased funding as well as capacity building.
The Bush administration, furthermore, designated the greater Horn of Africa a front-line
region in its global war against terrorism and has been working alongside Kenya’s
53
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
54
Lind, J., & Howell, J. (2010).Counter-terrorism and the Politics of Aid: Civil Society Responses in
Kenya. Development and Change Vol. 41 (2) , 335–353
28
government to dismantle Al Qaeda’s infrastructure in the region alongside those of
affiliated terrorist groups.55
To combat terrorism in the Horn of Africa, the United States, at the turn of the third
millennium created the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA), which
involved one thousand and eighteen hundred US soldiers and which was to be backed by
US Central Command. Based in Djibouti, CJTF-HOA'S mission was principally to deter,
pre-empt, and disable terrorist threats emanating principally from Somalia, Kenya, and
Yemen, assisted by a multinational naval interdiction force. In June 2003, President Bush
announced a one hundred million dollar package of counter-terrorism measures that was
set to be spent in the Horn of Africa region for over fifteen months. Half of these funds
was to support coastal and border security programs administered by the US Department
of Defense, ten million dollars was to be spent on the Kenyan Anti-Terror Police Unit
(ATPU), and fourteen million dollars to support Muslim education.56
The Western support especially from the United States was necessitated by the fact that
after September 11, 2001, the Horn of Africa region courted attention from global
terrorist groups as a possible new haven for Al Qaeda operatives driven from Afghanistan
during Operation Enduring Freedom. Somalia did not, as feared, become the replacement
operational base for Afghanistan, but it did serve as the base for the 2002 attacks in
Mombasa. The terrorist organization, Al Qaeda has a long standing, indigenous
infrastructure in the coastal region of Kenya as well as the environs of Nairobi and the
proven ability to transit in and out of Kenya via Somalia. Furthermore, the ease with
which Al Qaeda operatives operate in Kenya are suspected to be due to its proximity to
Somalia as well as having similar ease of access to Zanzibar, coastal Tanzania, and the
Comoros Islands.57
One of the winners of the western financial and logistical support was the police with the
formation of the Kenyan Anti-Terror Police Unit (ATPU) as a specialized unit formed to
help fight terrorism and as part of the Kenyan security agencies’ reform process of
55
Lyman, P., & Morrison, J. (2004).The Terrorist Threat in Africa. Foreign Affairs, Vol. 83, No. 1 , 75-86
Ibid
57
Ibid
56
29
making them relevant in fighting the new wars such as fourth generation warfare in
which terrorism forms a pertinent part. The unit was predominantly drawn from the
Ranger Strike Force and has been behind a number of security operations on the KenyaSomalia border to prevent terrorist infiltration by al Qaeda terror group as well as Al
Shabaab militias from war-torn Somalia. In a report prepared by the United States State
Department’s Office of the Coordinator of Counter-terrorism, the mandate for the unit
covered operations against infiltrators and armed groups, including terrorists.58
Within the Kenyan military, there were wide sweeping reforms, the first ever since the
radical Tonje Reforms, aimed at equipping the Kenyan Defense Forces (KDF) to fight
terrorism include the acquisition of additional F5 fighter aircrafts to be used in maritime
and counter terrorism surveillance. However, then Kenya’s Department of Defense
(DoD) spokesman Bogita Ongeri denied that there was such a unit, saying all military
anti-terrorism activities were being coordinated by the National Counter-Terrorism
Centre. Emergent information also revealed that the Kenya Navy had also received
training and equipment from the United States for maritime intervention operations in the
country’s territorial waters. The Maritime Police Unit and other government agencies
such as the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), also received equipment and training for
coastal security from the United States State Department’s Anti-terrorism Assistance
Programme and the United States military’s Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of
Africa.59
In addition, the United States jointly with the Kenyan government established a Maritime
Centre of Excellence whose mission was primarily to provide operational level training
that builds maritime safety and security capacity in order to promote a stable and secure
Africa part of measures being put in place by the government to step-up efforts to deal
with threats posed by terrorism as well as in helping Nairobi in addressing regional
maritime issues such as piracy, drug trafficking, illegal fishing, and environmental issues.
The centre was also tasked with capacity building among security agencies as well as in
helping to fulfill its commitment through collaborative efforts and shared interests of U.S.
58
All Africa. (2009, August 6). Kenya: New Anti-Terrorism Unit Formed. Retrieved June 25, 2014, from
The Republic of Kenya: republicofkenya.org/2009/08/kenya_new_anti-terrorism_unit_formed/
59
Ibid. Op. Cit.
30
and African nations to develop new ideas, increase cooperation and build partnerships to
establish regional stability.60
Other anti-terrorism initiatives taken in conjunction with Kenya’s international allies
especially in the West included installation of a Maritime Security and Safety
Information System (MSSIS) in key positions on the Kenyan coast, with the assistance of
the United States military. In addition, the American Department of Homeland Security’s
Customs and Border Control (CBP) office is also assisting Kenya Revenue Authority’s
Customs Department in meeting the World Customs Organization (WCO) Framework of
Standards to Secure Global Trade and addressing Export Border Control Issues. The
United States Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Control has also
been providing multi-agency training to Kenyan security personnel through workshops,
seminars, and courses covering airport, seaport, land border, and export control issues
and provided inspection equipment to customs and other agencies in Kenya engaged in
port and border security issues. The United States Department of Homeland Security’s
Customs and Border Control has also been assisting the Kenya Revenue Authority
(KRA) in improving and expanding its Canine Enforcement Programme. In May 2008
for example, government officials from different security agencies in Kenya travelled to
the US for training in airport, seaport and border security operations.61
The United States support of Kenya in initiating counter-terrorism measures also came at
a price. As part of the then United States president George Walker Bush’s attempt to
streamline his agenda of fighting terrorism globally, the “you are either with us or
against us” doctrine came into vogue. With this, the United States alongside Britain
were imposing anti-terrorism legislations that usually had little or no concern with human
rights.
60
See Waters, L. (2009, July 13). CJTF-HOA, Kenyan Government Hold First Maritime Center of
Excellence Ceremony. Retrieved June 25, 2014, from United States Africa Command:
http://www.africom.mil/Newsroom/Article/6753/cjtf-hoa-kenyan-government-hold-first-maritime-cen. See
also All Africa. (2009, August 6). Kenya: New Anti-Terrorism Unit Formed. Retrieved June 25, 2014, from
The Republic of Kenya: republicofkenya.org/2009/08/kenya_new_anti-terrorism_unit_formed/
61
All Africa. (2009, August 6). Kenya: New Anti-Terrorism Unit Formed. Retrieved June 25, 2014, from
The Republic of Kenya: republicofkenya.org/2009/08/kenya_new_anti-terrorism_unit_formed/
31
The roots of this draconian requirement lay in the wake of the brazen attacks carried out
by al Qaeda in the American hinterland on 11th September 2001. In order to combat the
threat of terrorism, it was argued, democratic citizens would have to accept legislation
placing constraints on their individual freedoms. In addition, the fight against terrorism
could not be won by national governments alone; it required countries around the world
to embrace similar measures. On 28th September 2001, a few days after September 11,
the largely united states dominated United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted
Resolution 1373 calling on member states to become party to all relevant international
conventions on terrorism and to enact the necessary domestic legislation to enforce these
agreements. Less than a month later the United States Congress passed the Uniting and
Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and
Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT) Act of 2001. Largely out of the United States
employment of “carrot and stick” methods to force anti-terror legislations in other
countries in the third world, by 2007, at least thirty three countries in Africa, Asia and
Latin America had either passed or introduced specific anti-terrorism legislation in their
parliaments.62
In 2003, Kenya’s newly elected government under Mwai Kibaki introduced in parliament
the Suppression of Terrorism Bill, setting off a firestorm of controversy. The antiterrorism bill generated fervent criticism among members of parliament, human rights
advocates, lawyers and religious leaders. Muslim populations felt especially targeted by
the proposed legislation. Widespread opposition forced the government to withdraw the
bill late in the year 2003. After two years of consultation with lawyers and civil society
organizations, a revised anti-terrorism bill was introduced in April 2006. Although the
new draft was widely acknowledged to be much more improved and safeguarding basic
human rights, several prominent members of parliament blocked its passage. Their
reason, quite simply, was that the bill was promoted by the United States.63 Such fears,
can better be seen as captured in a Filipino editorial stating that “treating the world like a
schoolyard where it reigns supreme, the United States made up the rules for those who
Whitaker, B. (2007). Exporting the Patriot Act? Democracy and the ‘War on Terror’ in the Third
World.Third World Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 5 , 1017 – 1032
63
Ibid
62
32
want to be on its good side - like the passage of laws outlawing terrorism, if possible
patterned after the United States’ own repressive Anti-Terrorism Law”.64
3.2.2 Anti – Terrorism Legislations and Policy Actions in Kenya
As previously aforementioned, on 28th September 2001, a few days after September 11,
the largely united states dominated United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted
Resolution 1373 calling on the United Nations’ member states to become party to all
relevant international conventions on terrorism and to enact the necessary domestic
legislation to enforce these agreements. The UNSC was deriving its mandate from Article
41 of the Charter of the United Nations which provided that the Security Council may
determine the measures not involving the use of armed force that may be employed to
give effect to its decisions, and call upon the Members of the United Nations to apply
such measures. The first attempt on anti-terror legislation were the largely Western
sponsored Suppression of Terrorism Bill which was introduced by the Kibaki
government to Parliament in 2003 but was unsuccessful as a result of the outcry from the
civil society, the opposition as well as from the Muslim community.
However, in 2013 a comprehensive legislation, The Prevention of Terrorism Act (No. 30
of 2012) dubbed The Prevention of Terrorism (Implementation of the United Nations
Security Council Resolutions on Suppression of Terrorism) Regulations, was successfully
passed into law in 2013. Under the new legislative framework, those convicted for
assisting in the commission of terrorists’ acts or found in possession of property intended
for the commission of terrorist acts could be jailed for up to twenty years. Furthermore,
the legislation also provides stiff penalties for membership to terrorist groups, and
recruiting, training and directing of terrorist groups and persons. In addition, the Act also
amends two extradition laws, making it legal to send terror suspects abroad for trial. The
64
Sigam, P. (2002, September 4). Anti-Terrorism Legislation in the Philippines: A Plot of Its Own. Cyber
Dyaryo
33
illegal rendition of suspects has been a major bone of contention with human rights
activists in the past.65
The Association of Muslim Organizations in Kenya had however expressed reservations
with a number of sections and had requested several amendments to the Prevention of
Terrorism Bill 2012 before it was signed into law.66 Kenya also domesticated all
international statutes she was party to by domesticating and incorporating them in the
constitution as is evidence in her constitutions Article 2 which states that “Any treaty or
convention ratified by Kenya shall form part of the law of Kenya”.67
3.3 Military Interventions by the Kenya Defense Forces (KDF)
In 2011, the Kenyan government sent its troops in a military incursion into Somalia as an
effort to flush out al Shabaab militants as well as al Qaeda operatives who were in the
terrorist haven of lawless Somalia and who were controlling illicit trade in the Somali
port of Kismayu. The decision in October 2011 to deploy thousands of troops in
Somalia’s Juba Valley to wage war on Al-Shabaab has been touted as the biggest security
gamble Kenya has taken since independence, a radical departure for a country that has
never sent its soldiers abroad to fight. The military incursion, codenamed “Operation
Linda Nchi” (Operation Protect the Country), was given the go-ahead with what has
shown itself to be inadequate political, diplomatic and military preparation. The incursion
culminated in the flushing of the Al Shabaab from their economic hub, Kismayu.
3.3 Counter – Piracy Efforts in Kenya
Kenya has taken various counter-piracy measures to protect her trade interests as the
gateway to East and Central Africa. Alongside, the United Nations Office on Drugs and
Crime (UNODC), Kenya has been able to put in place mechanisms on fighting piracy
65
The Standard. (2012, October 14). Kibaki Signs Historic Anti- Terrorism Bill. The Standard
Sabahi. (2012, June 29). Muslim Leaders Demand Changes to Kenyan Anti-Terrorism Bill. Retrieved
June 25, 2014, from Sabahi:
http://sabahionline.com/en_GB/articles/hoa/articles/newsbriefs/2012/06/29/newsbrief-04
67
Government of Kenya. (2010). The Constitution of Kenya. Nairobi: National Council for Law Reporting.
66
34
that has been disrupting her commerce. This has involved working in four key areas
namely; law enforcement, prosecution, courts and prisons. In terms of law enforcement,
UNODC has for example furnished Kenya with guidelines to help ensure that evidence
packages meet the legal obligations of regional legal systems realizes that once pirates
have guided by the fact that under international regulations, certain procedures must be
followed to ensure a fair trial for example the correct handling of evidence. In addition,
UNODC has provided police stations in Kenya with vehicles and other equipment to
facilitate their investigations as well as ensuring the transfer of weapons seized from
pirates to Nairobi for ballistic examination. Furthermore, funds have been provided for
the training of police in Kenya, as well as the installation of information technology
systems and exhibit rooms.68
In addition, the United Nations agency has also supported capacity building and
development within Kenya’s security agencies. In one of its counter piracy publications
for example, the UNODC details training courses that it has run for Kenyan detectives.
An example is that of UNODC Police Advisor Scott Girling, who has acted as a mentor
for Kenyan investigative officers to ensure that they are able to investigate piracy
offences effectively and make sure that they receive the necessary level of support. This
includes Regional Learning Exchanges as well as the provision of the necessary
equipment.69
3.4 Effectiveness of Kenya’s Security Measures against the Security Threats Arising
from Somali State Collapse
It is true that Al Shabaab has been weakened. However, it remains a formidable
adversary that understands local dynamics better than its foreign foes and can maximize
its asymmetric advantage. One tactical change has already become clear. Rather than
68
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2012). Counter-Piracy Programme; Support to the Trial
and Related Treatment of Piracy Suspects.United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. See also, Kraska, J.
(2011). Contemporary Maritime Piracy: International Law, Strategy and Diplomacy at Sea. California:
Praeger.
69
UONDC. (2011). Counter Piracy Programme: Support to the Trial and Related Treatment of Piracy
Suspects - Issue 7. Vienna: UONDC
35
fight in the open, it has melted into the background, allowing Kenyan mechanized
infantry to move deeper into its heartland. Its fighters blend into the civilian population
and distribute weapons. This is a result of lessons learned during the December 2006
Ethiopian intervention, when the Union of Islamic Courts deployed many of its
combatants, including Al-Shabaab, conventionally in the vast arid plains of south-western
Somalia, and they were decimated by ground and air fire.70
Indeed, Al Shabaab, Al Ittihad, Al Islami and Al Qaeda have both managed to infiltrate
cross-border refugee traffic and some Somali refugee camps in Kenya‘s North Eastern
Province and have made their way into Somali dominated neighborhoods in Nairobi and
Mombasa. From these convenient hideouts, these terror groups have been able to map
their targets and mount terror attacks. Major strides have however been made in curbing
piracy but largely out of concerted efforts by the international community in curbing the
vice in the high seas of not only the expansive gulf of Aden but also the open sea where
piracy has been on the rise.71
However, Kenya’s counter-terror strategy has been bungled by a few maladies which can
largely attribute to the failure of counter-terrorism operations in Kenya. An area that has
led to the ineffective counter-terror strategy is the inefficiency of the agencies involved.
Intelligence services and law-enforcement agencies are important in an effective
counterterrorism strategy. The key to winning the battle against terrorism is winning the
intelligence battle. Intelligence enables early detection of terrorists in time for lawenforcement officers or the military to act. However, for it to be of any value, intelligence
must be supported by effective law enforcement in conducting apprehensions and
disruptions of terrorist cells. Before 1998, there was a failure on the part of intelligence
and law-enforcement agencies to detect domestic and foreign terrorists freely operating
within the country. The ease with which these terrorists were entering and leaving the
country before the attacks raises questions about the ability and efficiency of intelligence
activities and law enforcement at the time. For example, effective intelligence and law
70
International Crisis Group. (2012). The Kenyan Military Intervention in Somalia. Crisis Group Africa.
See Otiso, K. (2009). Kenya in the Crosshairs of Global Terrorism: Fighting Terrorism at the Periphery.
Kenya Studies Review Vol. 1, No. 1, 107-132. See also Wetangula, J. (2013). The Effect of Somali Piracy
on Kenya's Maritime Sector. Nairobi: University of Nairobi
71
36
enforcement should have detected the terrorists when they were assembling the bomb in
the truck at the busy river-road streets in Nairobi, an area often filled with police. While
intelligence agencies and police failed to prevent the attack or dismantle Al Qaeda cells
in the initial stages, there are other agencies that contributed to the failures.72
The fight against terrorism is not a police battle alone; it also involves the Immigration
Department. Most of the terrorist suspects were foreigners. Some of the foreigners living
in Kenya had fake documents, including Kenyan national identity cards and passports.
Because of institutional corruption during the former regime, a person could easily obtain
Kenyan national identity cards, passports, birth certificates, or other documents through
Kenya’s black market. Terrorists have been exploiting such loopholes to enter the
country disguised as immigrants, tourists, or businessmen. Because of the Immigration
Department’s laxity, a large percentage of Pakistani and other immigrants reside in
Kenya. Some of these foreigners are engaged in microeconomic activities. Another area
the terrorists exploited was the lack of security awareness at the country’s entry points.
The ease with which Mohammed Saddig, a terrorist who was traveling on a fake
passport, left Nairobi via the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on 6 August 1998 (later
arrested at Karachi airport in Pakistan), is evidence of inefficiency on the part of the
Immigration Department.73
Additionally, corruption within the Kenyan security agencies has also been put to blame
over terrorism. Corruption within the Kenyan police force in the 1990s for example was
rampant that you could virtually bring anything into the country as long as you greased a
security officer’s hand. Furthermore, the failure of effective law enforcement also
contributed to the problem. The police force has for a long time been so ill-equipped that
it cannot respond to emergencies because of a basic lack of transportation and
communication resources. Despite the shortcomings noted, after the 1998 terrorist attack,
law-enforcement officials arrested several terrorist suspects a few days after the attacks.
These suspects were handed over to the US government to stand trial. While it can be
argued that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) helped in the arrests, the Kenyan
72
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
73
Ibid
37
government continued to track the terrorists and their supporters in the country after the
Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) concluded its preliminary investigations. In
November 2001 for example, the Kenyan government arrested more than twenty people
in Lamu who were suspected of having links with Al Qaeda along the Kenyan coast.74
Furthermore, although intelligence and law-enforcement agencies continued to track
terrorist suspects and their supporters in the country, it is evident there was a missing
link, either an effective approach was not applied or initial successes were the result of
external pressure. The lack of effective intelligence and law enforcement contributed to
the failure to deter the 2002 terrorist attacks. Although transnational terrorism had started
to establish roots in Kenya, the government made no progress in implementing
appropriate domestic legislation on terrorism-related issues. Counterterrorism legislation
is an important instrument of an effective counterterrorism strategy, and any government
confronted with the threat of terrorism should enact such legislation. The enactment of
such laws expresses the government’s political will to combat the threat.75
74
See Hared, A. (2005). Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S.
Army Command and General Staff College. See also Khadiagala, G. (2004). Kenya: Haven or Helpless
Victim of Terrorism.Retrieved June 3, 2014, from United States Institute of Peace. Special Report 113,
Terrorism in the Horn of Africa: www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr113.html
75
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College
38
CHAPTER FOUR
ANALYSIS OF DATA
4.1 Introduction
This chapter seeks to analyze the data in the study as well as offering a detailed analysis
in light of the study’s hypotheses as well as theoretical framework. The chapter basically
seeks to analyze data collected in chapter three on insecurity as well as how Kenya has
responded to the insecurity posed by the protracted civil war orchestrated and perpetrated
in the battlefields of the “sick man” of the horn of Africa region; Somalia. The analysis of
the data is critical in the study as it offers a solid foundation for the study’s chapter five.
4.2 Data Analysis
4.2.1 Has The Somalia State Collapse Led To Threats To Security In Kenya?
From the various literature reviews, it is obvious that the state collapse in Somalia that
was signaled by the fall of the dictatorial regime of Siad Barre has evidently led to a
threatening state of insecurity in Kenya. This was evident seven years after the collapse
of Siad Barre’s dictatorial regime in the year 1998 when on the fateful day of August 7, a
massive bomb exploded outside the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, killing 213 people,
among them twelve Americans-and injuring over 4,000. Responsibility was quickly
traced to Al Qaeda but intelligence as well as forensic evidence showed that the plot was
planned and executed by terror cells from Somalia. Four years later, Al Qaeda operatives
struck again, killing 15 people in an Israeli-owned hotel near Mombasa, Kenya, and
simultaneously firing missiles at an Israeli passenger jet taking off from Mombasa's Moi
International Airport. This attack too was meticulously planned and executed by terrorists
planning from their hideouts in the anarchical state of Somalia.
In addition, we have been able to deduce that the anarchy in Somalia offering an alluring
aura to terrorists who were being flushed out from their Afghanistan enclaves by superior
American military’s firepower, ammunition and technology. They were thus able to get a
safe haven in Somalia where they could be able to meticulously plan and execute terror
attacks in Kenya on both western interests as has been evident from the United States
Nairobi Embassy 1998 bombing to the 2002, Paradise Hotel, Kikambala attacks at the
39
Kenyan coast, which was Israeli-owned as well as 21st September,2013 Westgate
Shopping Mall gun attack being frequented by Israeli tourists and at the to the mall that is
located in up market Westlands area of Nairobi which was frequented by expatriates and
owned by an Israeli investor.
Non-Western interests have also not been spared as we have seen from the numerous
attacks that have been orchestrated in open air markets, churches, public transport
vehicles as well as villages and government installations such as police stations,
administration posts among others. In the sea front, we have seen how the strategic sea
space in the vast Gulf of Aden stretching all the way to the Kenyan coast has been turned
into a militias’ space of extraction through piracy activities by Somali sea militias
effectively taking the Kenyan economy hostage and hollowing it slowly and asphyxiating
it effectively bringing it to its knees over the long haul.
From the analysis, we can also see how Somali youths who were reduced to a dejected
suffering lot and were gullible out of material necessity have been exploited and used
both in terrorism as well as in piracy cases since the dawn of the 1990s. In the case of the
latter, youths have increasingly been recruited into piracy activities in the Horn of Africa
posing maritime threats as well as economic threats to neighbouring countries such as
those in east and central Africa, Kenya included.
With the longest coastline in Africa and its status as a “failure among failed states,”
Somalia is now the source of sixty two per cent of all pirate attacks worldwide.
Incidences of Somali piracy rose gradually from 1991 to 2005, when it took off, and
surged again in the years 2008 and 2009. Since then, pirates have pushed out from the
Gulf of Aden deep into the Indian Ocean. In the year 2010 for example, the International
Maritime Bureau attributed forty nine hijackings, sixteen boardings and one hundred and
fifty one attempted boardings to Somali pirates. One thousand and sixteen seafarers were
held hostage for ransom with the vast majority of these hostages though being released
unharmed after ship owners delivered payment, fourteen were reportedly killed by the
Somali pirates. Ransom payments to pirates in 2010 totaling US$112.79 million.
All these security breaches from the analysis have been the net effect of the Somali state
collapse which bred anarchy and lawlessness as well as competition over resources
40
especially the port of Kismayu after the fall of Siad Barre in 1991. We have seen how the
anarchy precipitated into a civil war where the clan warlords for example, fought over the
control of key positions that were likely to be strategic in minting revenue to them as well
as ensuring their access to the virgin and unexploited resources in Somalia such as cities
and towns like Mogadishu, Kismayu and Baidoa.
We have also deduced how foreign companies also fuelled the perennial conflict as they
explored and prospected for natural gas in disputed areas between regions,
administrations and clans. The conflict over resources is epitomized by the conflict
between the Hawiye and Darood over the control of Juba and Shabelle river valleys. We
have seen how scholars such as Joseph Kioi Mbugua (2013) have argued that
economically, Somalia performs poorly due to effects of the long war and resource
exploitation has not only exacerbated the conflict but also made it protracted.
Furthermore, we’ve seen how the fall of the Somali economy, which collapsed even
before the fall of the Siad Barre government in 1991 translated into the loss of livelihoods
to millions of people, neglect of infrastructure and breakdown of social services. There
have been severe threats to food security ever since with the most recent famine taking
place in 2011. All these were bound to have a spill-over effect in neighbouring states or
those with close proximity to the failed state and Kenya owing to its vast and porous
border with Somalia as well as having a huge chuck of Somali population among her
citizenry was bound to suffer. The very fact that Kenya which was considered as a haven
of peace was a natural refugee option to Somalis fleeing from the protracted civil war and
anarchy in their country increased the security threats more. This is largely due to the fact
that terrorists from Somalia can be able to masquerade as Somalis from Kenya or as
refugees and commit atrocities and mingle with the population. All this confirms the
study’s hypothesis; that the Somali state collapse has posed adverse threats to Kenya’s
security.
41
4.2.1 Kenya’s response to the various security threats that have been posed by the
Somali state collapse and the subsequent protracted civil war
From the analysis of data in chapter three, we can see that Kenya as a country has been
instituting a number of measures to deal with various security threats that have been
posed by the collapse of the Somali state and the subsequent protracted civil war.
However, as we have seen from the various terror attacks that have been following one
another in quick succession, each subsequent attack being deadlier and grievous than the
other, the counter terror operations have been ineffective. This is because of a number of
factors which have served as force multipliers in effectuating terror attacks. Kenya’s
counter-terror strategy has been bungled by a few maladies which can largely attribute to
the failure of counter-terrorism operations in Kenya. An area that has led to the
ineffective counter-terror strategy is the inefficiency of the agencies involved.
Intelligence services and law-enforcement agencies are important in an effective counterterrorism strategy.
The key to winning the battle against terrorism is winning the intelligence battle.
Intelligence enables early detection of terrorists in time for law-enforcement officers or
the military to act. However, for it to be of any value, intelligence must be supported by
effective law enforcement in conducting apprehensions and disruptions of terrorist cells.
Before 1998, there was a failure on the part of intelligence and law-enforcement agencies
to detect domestic and foreign terrorists freely operating within the country. The ease
with which these terrorists were entering and leaving the country before the attacks raises
questions about the ability and efficiency of intelligence activities and law enforcement at
the time. For example, effective intelligence and law enforcement should have detected
the terrorists when they were assembling the bomb in the truck at the busy river-road
streets in Nairobi, an area often filled with police. While intelligence agencies and police
failed to prevent the attack or dismantle Al Qaeda cells in the initial stages, there are
other agencies that contributed to the failures.76
76
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College.
42
The fight against terrorism is not a police battle alone; it also involves the Immigration
Department. Most of the terrorist suspects were foreigners. Some of the foreigners living
in Kenya had fake documents, including Kenyan national identity cards and passports.
Because of institutional corruption during the former regime, a person could easily obtain
Kenyan national identity cards, passports, birth certificates, or other documents through
Kenya’s black market. Terrorists have been exploiting such loopholes to enter the
country disguised as immigrants, tourists, or businessmen. Because of the Immigration
Department’s laxity, a large percentage of Pakistani and other immigrants reside in
Kenya. Some of these foreigners are engaged in microeconomic activities. Another area
the terrorists exploited was the lack of security awareness at the country’s entry points.
The ease with which Mohammed Saddig, a terrorist who was traveling on a fake
passport, left Nairobi via the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on 6 August 1998 (later
arrested at Karachi airport in Pakistan), is evidence of inefficiency on the part of the
Immigration Department.77
Additionally, corruption within the Kenyan security agencies has also been put to blame
over terrorism. Corruption within the Kenyan police force in the 1990s for example was
rampant that you could virtually bring anything into the country as long as you greased a
security officer’s hand. Furthermore, the failure of effective law enforcement also
contributed to the problem. The police force has for a long time been so ill-equipped that
it cannot respond to emergencies because of a basic lack of transportation and
communication resources.78
Furthermore, although intelligence and law-enforcement agencies continued to track
terrorist suspects and their supporters in the country, it is evident there was a missing
link, either an effective approach was not applied or initial successes were the result of
external pressure.
In addition, the lack of effective intelligence and law enforcement contributed to the
failure to deter the 2002 terrorist attacks. Although transnational terrorism had started to
establish roots in Kenya, the government made no progress in implementing appropriate
77
78
Ibid Op. Cit.
Ibid
43
domestic legislation on terrorism-related issues. Counterterrorism legislation is an
important instrument of an effective counterterrorism strategy, and any government
confronted with the threat of terrorism should enact such legislation. The enactment of
such laws expresses the government’s political will to combat the threat.79
However, the piracy operations can largely be seen to be a success with the lowering of
pirate attacks ever since the Kenyan government and her allies started a sustained
counter-piracy operation in the Gulf of Aden.
79
Hared, A. (2005).Combating Trans-National Terrorism in Kenya. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College.
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CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS
5.1 Summary
From the study it is evident that the collapse of Somalia as a state, and the subsequent
civil war and anarchical state that ensued accompanied by all maladies that dwarfed the
Hobbesian thesis on the state of nature, has led to adverse effects on the state of security
in Kenya with a “domino effect” on other sectors of this neighbor republic to the failed
state that is Somalia. It is also evident that the piracy activities orchestrated in the high
seas as well as the terror attacks that have been orchestrated in Kenya are largely
attributable to the state collapse in Kenya. It is of utmost importance that there is a review
of the various mechanisms so that we can have a multi-pronged approach to dealing with
the various threats posed by the state collapse in Somalia.
5.2 Recommendations
This study proposes to institute some recommendations that will be of import to the
government, the security agencies, intelligence operatives as well as other researchers in
the domain of international security in particular and international relations in general in
the hope of combating the various vices that are ravaging the Kenyan state and hollowing
her and bringing to their knees key sectors of the Kenyan economy such as the tourism
sector.
First, the government must be proactive in its overall counterterrorism strategy. This
effort largely departs from the reactive stance that the government of Kenya and her
security agencies has been employing. The main logic in this stance is so as to reduce the
risks of future terrorist attacks and as a strategy to the effect that terrorists the world over
have been known to lie in wait and strike when least expected. To this effect, this study
recommends that the government continue to employ more effectively the traditional and
nontraditional instruments of power such as diplomacy, military, economic, law
enforcement, intelligence, and legislation to combat terror threats.
Secondly, in order to improve the country’s efficiency in law enforcement as well as in
enhancing intelligence gathering, the country’s security agencies should be specially
45
trained in counterterrorism techniques, policing best practices and public relations in
order to inculcate a high degree of professionalism when dealing with the public. This
will go a long way in enhancing the public’s confidence in the police and forge a more
effective partnership to fight terrorism and other crimes in the country. In addition, a
structured police force that is embedded in the citizenry will greatly help the public
cooperate in providing intelligence. The government should also provide adequate
resourcing in terms of vehicles and communication to the police and the intelligence
communities to improve their efficiency. The country should also build forensic science
laboratories to facilitate the effective and efficient processing of evidence.
The fingerprint database at the Department of Immigration and Registration of Persons
should also be interlinked with the criminal investigation department to facilitate quick
tracking of suspects. Though Kenya might not have the resources to adequately train and
equip the police and the intelligence community and to establish a forensic laboratory, it
can always exploit the financial muscle of her international allies to help. The
government should also tackle corruption within the security agencies as well as at the
Department of Immigration and Registration of Persons so as to reduce this force
multiplier of terrorism.
Additionally, this study also calls for increased police – civilian cooperation as well as a
citizen security directed security and the socialization of the populace into an effective
security grouping. This is because such cooperation as well as the civic security
competence component is critical for any attempt at building up intelligence extraction
from society. It is also critical to enhancing citizen resistance to terrorists and criminals.
Finally, this study also recommends that there is a need for a regional approach,
synchronized activities among countries and institutions as well as intelligence sharing.
Additionally, the de-politicization and de-ethnicization of the country’s security sector is
also long overdue. There is also need for Kenya to lobby diplomatically for peace efforts
in Somalia.
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5.3 Conclusions
This study observes that the security threats emanating from state collapse in Somalia
from the twenty year period of 1993 and 2003 are ravaging the Kenyan state and
hollowing her and bringing to their knees key sectors of the Kenyan economy. The state
of insecurity has also been threatening to destabilize the state and lead to its eventual
disintegration. However, if the recommendations given above are followed and a
program of action along their lines is effectuated, we can turn the tide on our favour as a
country.
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