Tag Archives: wagalla massacre

Is Kenya prepared to go to war with Somalia over a disputed maritime territory?

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Dzl_1dDXQAAJ3kdOn Saturday the Kenyan foreign ministry recalled the Kenyan ambassador in Mogadishu and asked his Somalia counterpart to leave the country. This followed an alleged London auction of oil blocks in a disputed maritime zone by the Somalia government.

A Kenyan official characterized the auction as an “unparalleled affront and illegal grab at the resources of Kenya” that would “not go unanswered”.

The government of Somalia has since disputed the charge, and in a well reasoned letter asked the Kenyan government to reconsider its actions. Earlier, a Kenyan foreign ministry official had sought to de-escalate the situation by clarifying that the two ambassadors were merely asked to touch base with their respective governments in order to facilitate consultations.

19550580_401Kenya and Somalia hold rival claims on a triangular maritime territory in the Somali Sea (see image). The matter is currently under consideration by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

It is worth noting that Kenya and Somalia have not had the best of historical relations. In the 1960s Mogadishu supported an irredentist movement in northeastern Kenya. The rivalry cooled down during Somalia’s years of civil war. During the same period Kenya stumbled upon a policy of supporting any and all efforts to keep the conflict and instability on the Somalia side of the shared border. The latest expression of the policy has been to support the state of Jubaland, a matter that goes against the interests of Mogadishu. Jubaland State President Sheikh ‘Madobe’ Ahmed visited Kenya in December 2018, likely on a mission to strengthen intra-clan alliances and support from Nairobi. Kenya is a troop contributing country (TCC) under AMISOM, and for a variety of reasons remains to be a weak link in the fight against Al-Shabaab, the terror group.

The dust up between Kenya and Somalia reflects larger geopolitical contests for influence in Mogadishu. It is reasonable to assume that the dispute over the oil exploration blocks will not be restricted to the two countries. In addition to interested Western private energy firms (and their home governments), Mogadishu is likely to get support from its friends in the Gulf and Turkey. Meanwhile, Kenya’s primary leverage will be its important role in AMISOM. A fallout with Nairobi would likely cause serious problems for Mogadishu, and pose a serious challenge to Somalia’s territorial integrity — Jubaland may find support to sue for independence from Mogadishu.

For now, both Kenya and Somalia have expressed public commitments to respect ICJ’s ruling regardless of the outcome. This is encouraging. Existing research suggests that states are less likely to escalate tensions if they commit to legal means of settling territorial disputes.. Indeed, Nigeria and Cameroon provide a good example of two countries that managed to settle a border dispute in a potentially oil-rich area amicably.

All to say that I don’t think Kenya is going to war with Somalia any time soon.

 

Remembering The Wagalla Massacre

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This happened. Only 31 years ago. Lest we forget.

[O]n February [10th] 1984, soldiers of the Kenya Army mounted a security operation around Wajir in Kenya’s North Eastern Province. Having rounded-up all Somali men of the Degodia clan, as many as 5000 were taken to the Wagalla airstrip for interrogation. This was part of the policy of ‘collective punishment’ – a conscious act of state violence against its own citizens. After four days of interrogations at Wagalla, several hundred Degodia lay dead: whether 500 died, or 1000, or more is unknown, but the incident stands as the worst atrocity in Kenya’s modern history. This article recounts what is known about the massacre from witness and survivor testimony, putting this together with documentary evidence recently revealed through the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) and setting the analysis in the wider context of Kenya’s treatment of the peoples of its ‘forgotten north’. The conclusion summarises the findings of Kenya’s TJRC on Wagalla, and comments on the recent construction of a monument to commemorate the massacre, opened at Wajir on 14 February 2014.

The following individuals held a top level meeting in the Wajir DC offices on February 8th, two days before the massacre: Joseph Kaguthi (Asst. Secretary, Internal Security), James Mathenge (PS, OP in charge of Internal Security), Gen. J. R. Kibwana (former CGS), John Gituma (PS, Information and Broadcasting), Benson Kaaria (PC, North Eastern), Bethuel Kiplagat (PS Foreign Affairs), and David Mwiraria (PS, Home Affairs). Mwiraria has in the past argued that he and others at the meeting had not idea about what was about to happen.

Because of the failure to effectively deal with instances of gross state overreach like the Wagalla Massacre, impunity within the security services continues. Government reactions to insecurity in the northwest, at the coast, in the northeast, in dealing with Mungiki, out west in Mt. Elgon, and even in Eastleigh, are continuations of an old habit that goes back to the Mau Mau concentration camps under the emergency.

Throughout the “Shifta” war and well into the 1980s..

collective punishment continued to be used to ‘discipline’ the north, amid a growing sense of official impunity, as was evident in the collective punishment of a Somali community in Garissa

More on this here.

Here is the Citizen TV documentary from 2012.

[youtube.com/watch?v=KlrEJ5u7YY8]

The Kenya Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission Report

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The TJRC was set up following the 2007-08 post-election violence to collect views from Kenyans on various cases of historical injustices going back to the colonial times. The Commission was also mandated to recommend actions to be taken following publication of its findings. Unlike past commissions whose reports were quickly shelved and hidden from the public following their release, you can now download the entire IV volume TJRC report here.

The report offers very little in new information regarding cases of land grabbing, political assassinations, ethnic violence and ethnically biased use of state resources. What is new in the report is the provision for recommendations that are backed by force of law to implement the report. The implementation mechanism is independent and has to report to the relevant commission on its work every six months.

The report recommends reparations, investigations and prosecutions in certain cases. It also asks for public apologies from the Government of Kenya and state agencies that have historically been used to commit atrocities, including the Wagalla massacre, Nyayo torture chambers and extra-judicial killings by the police.