Terror is rapidly shrinking geographies and has emerged as a truly trans-national enterprise that specialises in manslaughter and packages savagery in the guise of a perverse ideology. Five years ago, it was Mumbai, now it’s Nairobi. In the most spectacular attack on Nairobi since an al Qaeda bomb attack on the US embassy in 1998, terror has now returned to haunt Kenya’s capital and East Africa’s metropolitan hub, with a stunning savagery.
The latest mayhem in an upscale mall in Nairobi, which has so far killed 69 people, including two Indians, two Canadians, two French citizens, a South Korean, a South African, a Dutch woman, has underlined the trans-national nature of terrorism, which respects no boundaries.
Unreal City
In the last decade, trans-national terror syndicates have victimised a host of cities – terrorists’ targets have been inevitably big cities, with their inclusive ethos of absorbing diverse people and cultures. The fact that a world-class swanky shopping mall, which symbolises the face of an aspirational African middle class and is thronged by affluent expatriates, was targeted provides some clues to the ideology of the terrorists. The selection of the target – the Westgate shopping mall, which is part owned by an Israeli company – also throws light on the hideous ideology of al-Qaeda-backed Somali terror group al-Shabaab, which has owned responsibility for the attack.
The terror siege inside a swanky mall, hostage-taking, the choice of the target — this is all eerily reminiscent of the 26/11 Mumbai terror mayhem when ten Pakistan-based terrorists attacked the iconic Taj Hotel and also chose the Jewish Chabad House as one of their targets. In both cases, the larger target was the cosmopolitan culture of big cities and the message was aimed at the West and its allies to warn them from what militant Islamist ideologues call anti-Islamic activities.
India shocked
India, which has suffered multiple terror strikes over the years in the name of delusional and warped ideologies, has been quick to condemn this latest act of brutality and underlined its solidarity to the government and people of Kenya.
With two Indians being killed and many other Kenyan-Indians injured, the 70,000 strong Indian community in the East African country is in a state of shock. Terror is the last thing the Kenyan-Indians have come to expect in a country which they have eagerly embraced as their home for decades and enriched it with their skills, enterprise and business savvy.
In some ways, the terror siege in the Westgate mall is an attack on the syncretic culture of Kenya, a pluralistic culture which made it attractive for generations to Indians to pitch their tent and thrive in this country, which is better known for its uber luxury wild life safari.
A Slice of India
Cultures and languages intersect effortlessly in Nairobi. There are all-Indian malls, the Indian Bazaar, any number of Indian restaurants offering a mouth-watering variety of Indian cuisine and theatres showing Indian films.
Chapatis are for Christmas and biryani is for weddings. And samosas are forever. Traces of India and Indians can be found just about everywhere in the leafy, sunlit streets of the Kenyan capital that is fast emerging as an economic magnet for the East African region.
With waiters dressed in colourful Indian attire and sentimental Hindi film songs sweetening the air, Haandi in Westlands is a big draw with Indians as well as Africans and expatriates craving for Indian food and a taste of India.
Rallying against terror
But the food is not going to taste the same anymore in Westland, with the stench of terror in the air. The al-Shabab, with its concoction of a deadly cocktail of anti-West rhetoric, imaginary and real grievances and the ideology of silencing contrary viewpoint with the rattle of gunfire, has poisoned the atmosphere, and will be looking for more such targets.
Kenyans are, however, determined not to give in to such hideous designs. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, who has confirmed that that one of his nephews and his nephew’s fiancee were among the people killed, has made it clear that terrorists “shall not get away with their despicable and beastly acts.” “We will punish the masterminds swiftly and indeed very painfully,” he said. In this resolve to punish mass murderers, the Kenyan leader will find much support among the international community as well as among his countrymen, but to build an enduring bulwark against the poison of extremist ideologies, he will have to address underlying causes that makes ideology-fuelled militancy attractive for some sections.
For one thing, The Kenyan leader has to ensure that the youth bulge in his country is harnessed creatively into a demographic dividend and does not degenerate into what a Kenyan writer has called “a serious unemployment time bomb.” “Kenyan youths are now facing a serious unemployment time bomb. The country’s number of jobless youth stands at 2.3 million. Church leaders have warned this ‘demographic trap’ could see more crime, militant gangs, terrorism, labor unrest and political violence,” Moses Michira wrote in an article entitled “The time bomb that is millions of jobless youth”, in The Standard early this year. This is a sensible piece of advice, but even as the Kenyan government struggles to fix many ills the country is beset with, they should not become an excuse to muddle the fight against terror, which must go on without any qualifier.
Author Profile
- Manish Chand is Founder-CEO and Editor-in-Chief of India Writes Network (www.indiawrites.org) and India and World, a pioneering magazine focused on international affairs. He is CEO/Director of TGII Media Private Limited, an India-based media, publishing, research and consultancy company.
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