For Kenya to win the war on terror, national consensus on the Somalia incursion is a must

Some leaders want us to capitulate through unplanned withdrawal from Somalia with no regard to conditions on the ground but Al-Shabaab terrorists are in for the long haul, writes Kemoli Sagala

What is the “state of the nation” of Kenya? What about its national security?

The simple answer is that Kenya is at a crossroads. On one hand, the country has the very ingredients for a take-off; in fact, pundits say Kenya has been on the runway for far too long.

It has a vibrant and emerging middle class, a liberal democratic society, devolved system of governance, free media, stellar civil society, educated population with adult literacy rates of 87 per cent, a bulging young population, booming economy with newly discovered hydrocarbon fuels, a consumptive economy with appetite for imported goods and higher public wage demands, favourable external reserve accounts buttressed by sustained diaspora remittances of $1,357 million as of June 2014 from $1,199 million as of June 2013 and relatively stable macro-economic conditions.
On the other hand, the reverse of the above factors threatens the very “state of the nation” and its core values.

Kenya cannot sustain the exploding public wage bill that consumes 12 per cent of its GDP above the world recommended seven per cent.

In 2013/2014, Kenya’s wage bill was Sh458 billion and accounted for roughly half its tax revenues. This is an economic and security problem that must be addressed quickly. It requires re-calibrating of the public service to focus on key productive sectors that generate wealth.

At the same time, the young population is vulnerable to political unrest and frustrations, unemployment and radicalisation.

There is a need to open up new opportunities to empower the youth through technical and vocational training and entrepreneurial opportunities. If properly managed, the Uwezo Fund could spur wealth.

Corruption has undermined every aspect of the country’s governance structures and its security. In Termites At Work, Peter Gastrow laments: “While to the onlooker, Kenya appears to be in a relatively healthy state, it is in fact weakening due to internal decay.”

The challenges posed by drug trafficking, illicit trade in counterfeit goods, trafficking of wildlife products, people and small arms require serious attention.

How else would one explain the sumptuousness of the political elite and the private sector amidst poverty, hunger and disease afflicting 70 per cent of the population?

How can people in Turkana and Wajir die of starvation when there is abundance of food in certain parts of Kenya? How else can one explain the security and insecurity parallels across the country?
Kenya is also confronting the challenges of effectively implementing its “big bang” devolution and harnessing the expanded liberal democratic state.

Kenyans are not adequately equipped with the understanding that the enjoyment of liberty has an inherent duty therein. There exists a contradiction between the “state of the nation” per se and the expanded democratic space.

HOSTAGE

Increasingly, Kenya remains hostage to transnational organised crime and the politics of grievance necessitated by the history of socio-economic exclusion of certain communities. The discovery of oil, gas and coal could actually generate social and economic upheaval. Kenya should avoid the resource curse — a phenomenon that Nigeria and other oil producing countries in Africa are well endowed with.
Radicalisation of the youth, terrorism, onslaught of jihadists and homegrown violent extremists threaten the very fabric of the nation.
Peter Pham argues: “The growing number of militants in Kenya and trained jihadists returning from Somalia is a serious concern — or ought to be — for both US policymakers and their Kenyan counterparts.”
In the January 2014 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community, James R.Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence observed: “East African governments will have difficulty protecting the wide range of potential targets as Al-Shabaab will target Kenya and East Africa to punish those countries that deployed troops to Somalia.”
Kenya has been fighting an asymmetric war against Al-Shabaab since 2011 when its troops crossed the border. There is a division between the government and the opposition on the way forward.
My assessment of the war strategy vis-à-vis Al-Shabaab suggests the need for a grand strategy.
The current strategy has failed in terms of the structure of the conflict, the choice of strategy, our strategic interaction in counter insurgency, the dangers of internal political vulnerability and the societal cleavages within Kenya’s liberal democratic space. These problems, unless properly managed, will favour Al-Shabaab.
How will this pan out?
The lack of a national consensus on the way forward could undermine the legitimacy of the mission in Somalia. Unfortunately those seeking Kenya’s withdrawal from Somalia view the conflict as a “limited war,” while Al-Shabaab says it is a total war. Thus while some Kenyans want us to capitulate through unplanned withdrawal with no regard to conditions on the ground, Al-Shabaab are in for the long haul.

Al-Shabaab poses the political zeal and unparalleled determination to inflict collateral damage on Kenya. While Kenya suffers from what Ringmose labelled “internal dispute about the necessity or the legitimacy of the war efforts”, Al-Shabaab has zero political vulnerability and huge internal cohesion.

Although the terror group has proclaimed retaliatory attacks against Kenya unless we pull out troops, it is pretty obvious that once Kenya does that, the terrorists will reframe the argument and resort to new demands and attacks on the premise of the dalliance of the government with the West and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

EMPOWERED ALL AND SUNDRY

Kenya’s liberal democratic space has empowered all and sundry with little or meagre knowledge of military strategy to “rally” against the KDF operation.

Seemingly the anti-war brigade could win but Kenya will lose badly. Needless to say when Kenya went to war, leading luminaries of the opposition sat in the National Security Council that authorised it.

Writing in the July/August 2014 Foreign Affairs, Paul Hidalgo said “Al-Shabaab is relishing every moment. A divided Kenya is ideal for the militant group.”

Al-Shabaab has been consolidating its base and increasing its appeal and membership through preaching, radicalisation, social media campaigns, slick e-magazines, propaganda videos, use of non-Somalis to stage attacks, the idea of an Islamic caliphate covering East Africa, expanded attacks on soft targets and the citation of the Quran in selecting its ultimate targets to ignite sectarian violence and spawn religious conflict.

The grand strategy to prevent radicalisation and the venom of global jihad requires a multi-sectoral approach from the national government to redress the existing grievances and appearance of indiscriminate targeting of Muslims.

The strategy must align the ends, ways and means of assuring national security within the confines of the Constitution. It should harness the history, political and socio-cultural knowledge of communities bordering Somalia as a point of entry and not surrender this to the quest for operational and tactical success.

Given the nature of the asymmetric conflict we are engaged in, there is no doubt that we will continue to deploy KDF internally. Nonetheless, military campaigns should not just be based on tactical and operational manoeuvres; there is a serious need of a suave political strategy.

Whenever KDF are deployed internally, their role should be spelt out and the communities sensitised about it. The challenge for KDF is to manage effectively the use of force and avoid excessive collateral damage i.e., desist from using disproportionate force and only go after the bad guys while engaging communities in human intelligence.

Dr Kemoli Sagala works at the Kenya School of Government. The views are solely his and do not represent the school in any manner.