Ngovi Kitau
30 June 2009
opinion
Nairobi — IN THE LAST FEW DAYS, SOME Kenyans have been advocating that our military should buttress Somalia's Transitional Federal Government which is under siege from militant Islamist insurgents led by Al-Shabaab.
Our rhetoric against belligerent Somali Islamists has recently hardened. This is because Al-Shabaab, the deadliest guerrilla army operating in Africa, has warned that they would strike, should we deploy our troops along the 1,200-kilometre boundary with Somalia.
This threat has upset many Kenyans for two reasons. One, since Somali warlords toppled dictator Siad Barre and he fled the country in January 1991, Kenyans have been extending invaluable hospitality to fleeing Somalis.
For example, the protracted bloody crisis has created the world's largest refugee camp inside Kenya, at Dadaab, 80 kilometres from the Somali border. The camp was meant to handle 90,000 refugees. But today, they are 280,000.
Secondly, Kenyans have worked tirelessly to export law and order to a country which has been dismembered by warlords and pirates, who rule through jungle laws.
Kenya was behind the Eldoret Declaration which Somali warlords signed on October 27, 2002. This is what led to the formation of the TFG in Nairobi in October 2004.
Now, while it is clear Al-Shabaab threat cannot be ignored because they have sophisticated jihadist combatants from foreign countries, the calls for military intervention are ill-advised.
By engaging these guerrillas, Kenya will have been sucked into a trap like Ethiopia was in 2006. This is the objective of Al-Shabaab.
The group, whose members are mainly from the Hawiye clan, has built a formidable force over the last few years by using the excuse of Ethiopia's invasion and US incursions to whip nationalism. This way, they have been able to bring the other clans under their command.
WITH THE WITHDRAWAL OF ETHIOPIAN troops, and the US changing strategy from bombing campaigns to providing weapons and ammunition through friendly countries, the insurgents now lack a common cause. A Kenyan intervention is just what they need to galvanise support again.
This hypothesis is valid for one good reason. Since the exit of Barre and his Dorad clan-dominated regime, several foreign incursions have taken place inside Somalia. In all cases, each has failed, and only provided an opportunity for militant groups to recruit.
The second reason is that intervention would be counter-productive to the ongoing UN-brokered Djibouti peace process.
This is the reconciliation between the TFG and a faction of Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia which began in May 2008. It is the process which led to the election of Sheik Sharif Ahmed.
Rather than conduct another ruinous military intervention which would give insurgents a common cause to unite, the international community should bring all bitter enemies to the negotiating table.
Currently, Al-Shabaan, a faction of ARS led by Sheikh Aweys, Puntland and Somaliland are not part of the Djibouti process. This makes TFG look like a faction instead of a national authority.
And since each faction is in control of some economic infrastructure, the negotiations should include revenue-sharing. This is important because it is possible to engage people into a negotiation process if they are convinced they can gain.
This process has to go hand in hand with some form of international economic and security rescue package.
Mr Kitau is the managing director, Bruce Trucks and Equipment (EA) Ltd.
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