Coast Al-Shabaab recruits snub Nkaissery's offer for amnesty

Terror suspects Salim Salmin Fara (left), Said Mohammed Shee (second left) and Salim Ayub (second right) chat the way forward with Haki Africa’s Human Rights Co-ordinator Francis Auma in February. [PHOTO: FILE/STANDARD]

MOMBASA: Most Al-Shaabab recruits have been reluctant to take up the Government's offer for amnesty.

Suspected radicalised youth in Mombasa, Kwale and Kilifi counties, which have had the most terrorist attacks and assassinations, have not stepped forward as requested by Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery.

The blacklisting of Haki Africa and Muslim for Human Rights, Muhuri, following the April 2 terrorist attack in Garissa seems to have compounded the problem.

The two groups that spearheaded surrenders in the past now stand accused by the State of financing terrorism and their operations have been grounded through an assets' freeze.

The Standard spoke to several suspects in Mombasa who said they were now afraid of approaching the two groups for fear of attracting the wrath of the State, a claim confirmed by Francis Auma an official of Haki Africa. Auma told The Standard last evening: "Since we were blacklisted, trust in us has been eroded and these youths now fear coming to us."

Auma, who noted that the recruits do not trust the police, said Haki Africa could not engage in the matter because of the "yoke of suspicion hanging over its neck".

Meanwhile, Sheikh Khalifa, the organising secretary of the Council of Imams and Preachers of Kenya (CIPK), which is involved in combating extremism, also said no one had gone to them to surrender.

But he revealed that since the amnesty was declared, five parents had approached the organisation to report that their children had disappeared without trace and feared they could have joined extremist groups.

Khalifa said it was hard for those who have joined Al-Shabaab in Somalia to surrender. "If they are not around how can they surrender or come out?" he posed Sunday.

"Only one (militant) has surrendered to Kisauni police in Mombasa," according to Mombasa County Deputy Police Commander James Kithuka. Kithuka said the fear of reprisals from radical Islamists and "fear of the outcome of surrender" was making militants not to take advantage of the clemency.

In Kwale, where reports state that about 70 local youths were recruited to join Al-Shabaab in the past five years and trained in Somalia by slain terror suspect Suleiman Mwayuyu and fugitive Bilal Mwacheti, not a single person has come forward.

And no one has turned up in Kilifi County either, including in Malindi town where Al-Shabaab cells were behind the killing of three counter-terrorism officials in 2013 and last year.

In Msambweni, Tiwi and Matuga where most of the estimated 70 militants come from, there is suspicion among recruits that the amnesty is a trap to kill or arrest them.

MUSA MOSQUE

Further, some of them argue that joining Al-Shabaab and opting for jihad is an irrevocable oath that cannot be countermanded by promises of earthly clemency and a ministerial decree.

Kilifi County Police Commander Douglas Kanja said Sunday that, so far, no militants have come out to surrender. Parents have not reported about their missing children, although there is strong evidence that many youths have left for Somalia.

And Sunday, police in Mombasa admitted that they had lost contact with 29 youths arrested in the controversial February 2, 2014 raid on the Musa Mosque.

There are reports that some of them fled to Somalia after their colleagues were jailed. Six people were killed, including a police officer during the storming of the mosque, which was aimed at arresting those indoctrinating youths to join Al-Shabaab.

A man seized by police in the raid, Hemed Said Hemed, has been missing since and an inquest into his arrest and disappearance, which was ordered the court has not been launched to date.

Kithuka believes "hundreds of youths from Mombasa have joined Al-Shabaab" and that half of them could be in Mombasa and the rest in Somalia.

"When you join a society and you try to leave it, those who remain will see you as an enemy," he said referring to the fear of reprisals from radicals in Mombasa.

He assured that the State was ready to rehabilitate those who renounce militancy.

Recalling the events of last year's storming of Musa Mosque, the officer said the State had rehabilitated most of the 115 youths detained in the raid.

"Most of them have reformed and returned to society," he said, and disclosed that five of the youths found employment in Qatar.

"We have confirmed that one is in Somalia," Kithuka said, noting that 29 guardians of some of the youths arrested in the Musa Mosque raid are no longer co-operating with police to establish the whereabouts of their children.

In Msambweni Sub County in Kwale, which has been most affected by assassinations blamed on Al-Shabaab, no one has turned up, according to local District Commissioner Mwangangi Mwania who said the Government was concerned by the lack of response.

"For most of them, radicalisation has entered their blood and the only way is to undo that. Right now I am not aware of any youth who has turned up (for amnesty)," he said.