By: Abdikadir Okash
NAIROBI—There is a growing fear among Kenyan Muslims, particularly the Somali youths as cases of mysterious disappearances escalate.
Shortly after the Garissa University attack on 2nd April, the security agencies started security operations across Kenya, particularly the northern part of the country, the coastal areas and the city of Nairobi.
In the operations, scores of suspects were arrested and released, but quite a number of those arrested are yet to be seen. And some of them have also been reported missing after they were reportedly arrested by people who rightly identified themselves as police officers after they flushed out police budges, and driven away their suspects in an unmarked vehicles.
A well documented case is that of Hamza Mohamed Bare last seen on 8th April at 2 PM at his electronics shop in Garissa town, four days after the Garissa University attack. Two men posing as shoppers came to the shop and after brief negotiations over price of a mobile phone, they were joined by two others who flushed out police badge and handcuffed him. Hamza did not resist arrest and was driven away in an unmarked car.
Ismail* (not his real name) said he was at the shop at the time of the arrest. He stated that after the arrest, he went to check him at the police station.
“When I went to the nearby police station, to my shock, he was not in the police register. The people who arrested him did not take him to a police station. I don’t know his whereabouts,” he said.
Hamza’s case is not unique, but is part of what human rights campaigners termed as “deliberate and increased cases of extra-judicial killings targeting mainly ethnic Somalis and Muslim youths in the predominantly Muslim areas of the country.”
Nairobi based human rights campaigner Al-Amin Kimathi, said the number of missing Muslim youths in the country was getting higher, blaming the State and the police over the matter.
“By July this year, more than 100 men were reported missing in Mandera, 50 in Garissa and 36 in Wajir and the number is increasing,” he said.
During the International Day for the Disappeared marked this year in Nairobi, human rights orgernisations petitioned the United Nations Special Rapporteur on counter-terrorism to probe the matter.
Speaking at the event, the former Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka has laid the blame on the Anti Terror Police Unit. ATPU is charged with counter-terrorism operations.
Siaya Senator James Orengo has termed the mysterious disappearances as a form of social cleansing.
“What is happening (the mysterious disappearances) is a form of social cleansing, ” he said.
Nark chairman Martha Karua, on her part, tasked the State to explain the mysterious disappearances, saying it was aware of the operations.
“If it’s not the state, it’s for the state to worry about the break of law and order. What are they doing about it? It has happened once too many for us to think it’s not the state.
“The only conclusion is that it’s the State, and if not, they are encouraging the situation,” she said.
Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery has directed a team of detectives to probe the alleged extrajudicial killings of Muslim youths.
“We want to get to the bottom of this allegation. It’s the cardinal responsibility of the security organs to protect Kenyans and not to make them disappear. We must find out the truth,” said Nkaissery.
As the fear mounts and the blame game continues, the families of those who disappeared are asking the government to locate their loved ones.
