112. In 1977, this already bad situation took a drastic turn for the worse with the outbreak of war between Ethiopia and Somalia. While complicated by the Cold War politics of the time, the ‘Ogaden War’, as it came to be known, was rooted in the same soil as the Shifta War before it: the desire of the government of Somalia to incorporate ethnic Somalis living in the Ethiopian province of Ogaden into Somalia proper. Some residents of the Ogaden region of south-eastern Ethiopia supported the project.46 In July 1977, almost the entire Somali army crossed into Ethiopia to join forces with the secessionist Western Somali Liberation Front. It was an audacious and provocative move that drew an immediate reaction from the central Ethiopian government of Mengistu Haile Mariam.
113. The two years of intensive fighting that followed resulted in the loss of more than 12 000 lives. The war ended not only with Somalia’s defeat, but also saw the beginning of the collapse of the Somalia state which descended into anarchy after President Siad Barre was ousted from power a decade later. The Ogaden Liberation Front continued
45 Nene Mburu ‘Contemporary Banditry in the Horn of Africa: Causes, History and Political Implications’ (1999) 8 Nordic Journal of African Studies 100
46 For detailed work on the background to and the conduct of the war see Joseph Nkaissery ‘The Ogaden War: an analysis and its impact on regional peace on the horn of Africa’ at http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA326941&Location=U2&d oc=GetTRDoc.pdf. Accessed 3rd March 2012
its limited efforts at secession and engaged in skirmishes with the Ethiopian army.
The Ogaden War had a profound effect on Northern Kenya as well. It triggered, for instance, the southward migration of refugees from the Ogaden, as well as the defeated Somali army troops into both Wajir and Mandera districts.47 Alongside the refugees flowed a current of sophisticated, illegal and unregistered weapons.
When these weapons found their way into the hands of the disenfranchised and increasingly criminal former Shifta, the stage was set for serious instability.
114. It was important therefore for the Commission to establish how such instability manifested itself on the ground. As has been mentioned earlier, it was difficult to get a full understanding of the role of former Shifta fighters; witnesses did not speak about them in very precise ways. Many, however, testified about violations committed by civilian gunmen. While it is impossible to be completely certain, it is possible to attribute a good number of these incidents to ex-Shifta. The attacks were violent, random and seemed to serve no other purpose than to prey upon local residents. The Commission heard a disturbing, but not particularly unusual, case in Garissa. An Ijara family’s hut was invaded by a gang of two gunmen.
After a brief struggle, the mother was shot dead. The men attempted to rape the young women of the household but were chased away by the arrival of friends and neighbours alerted by their screams. Nearly 30 years later, the family is still traumatised by the event as told by one of the surviving daughters:
My father was working for the government of Kenya by then. During the time that my mother was killed, he was on leave and was in the house. When he heard what had happened, he was shocked and became mentally disabled. My two brothers also became mentally disabled. They were the only sons that my mother had.
Later, nobody came to ask about what had happened to us. Nobody bothered to know about the calamity that had befallen us. I had to start taking care of the younger ones.48 115. Such stories were a common feature of life in North Eastern in the 1970s and 1980s.
An already traumatised population was subjected to further bouts of violence and criminality.
116. The state’s response to the rising wave of insecurity during this period was weak and uncoordinated. Many of these attacks did not prompt any kind of sustained police investigations, criminal charges or anything along those lines. Generally, it was difficult for the police and local administrations to take action in response to every single raid. The scale and frequency of the banditry, coupled with the large distances involved, made that kind of follow-up impossible. Even so, the Commission’s overall
47 Jennifer Hyndman ‘A post-cold war geography of forced migration in Kenya and Somalia’ (1999) 51 Professional Geographer 104 48 TJRC/ Hansard/ Public Hearing/ 13 April 2011/ Garissa/ p.2
impression was that the government could have been more energetic in pursuing security for the residents of the region. There is little evidence to indicate that even the most preliminary of efforts were made to address banditry and its impact on the civilian population. The Ijara family, for example, has never had any interaction with government representatives over the death of their mother. Again, it is highly unlikely that the Ijara case was exceptional.
Government reactions seem only to have become more focused when Shifta banditry began to engulf targets more closely associated with the government itself. The government was only moved into action when the issues, targets and victims mattered to the state itself. Organised poaching illustrates this approach.
Poaching
117. Few things raised government temperatures more reliably than the Shifta-driven trade in ivory, rhino horns, leopard skins and other valuable animal trophies. The 1970s and 1980s were characterised by a surge in such activity. Poaching had, however, been a fact of the economic life of Northern Kenya even during the colonial period. Somali hunters and traders created a formidable network that trafficked horns, tusks and skins through the Northern Frontier Districts (NFD) and to the coastal ports of Kismayu, Lamu and Mogadishu.49 An under-staffed and under-financed Kenya Game Department could do little to curb a trade that in the 1930s was valued at hundreds of thousands of rupees (the currency used at that time). The introduction of a series of hunting licenses and fines for non-compliance had very little impact. Ironically, the very profitability of poaching was what eventually drove the poachers out of business. Herds in Northern Kenya were severely depleted, leaving the hunters with little left to poach.
118. The outbreak of the Shifta War in the 1960s had a chilling effect on the trade in game trophies. Very little hunting could take place in an atmosphere of all-out fighting. As soon as the war ended, however, the hunters returned to re-establish their networks. The armed bandits spread throughout the region would prove to be their natural allies. In the late 1980s, raiders and bandits from Somalia proper would also join the fray. It did not take long for this new and highly aggressive breed of hunters and fighters to make an impact. In the early 1970s, parliamentarians from Samburu, Isiolo, Marsabit, Meru and the Tana River Basin were up in arms at the sudden appearance of violent gangs of armed men in their constituencies’
parks and game reserves.50
49 For descriptions, see Peter Dalleo ‘The Somali role in organized poaching in northeastern Kenya c.1909 – 1939 (1979) 12 International Journal of African Historical Studies 472
50 For an example of such exchanges, see Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) 5 May 1970, 201 – 202
119. With thousands of elephants and rhinos killed, conservationists began to speak openly about the complete disappearance of these animals from Kenya’s ecosystems.51 Anxieties surrounded the continued viability of Kenya’s vital tourist industry. The export of violent poaching to other parts of the country triggered an outcry. With one outrageous attack after another on animals, tourists and game rangers, public anger at government inaction reached a fever pitch. Mr.
Kholkholle, the member of parliament for Marsabit South, spoke for many Kenyans when he questioned the ineffective response from the Ministry of Wildlife and the government as a whole:
I am very surprised for the Assistant Minister to say that these poachers have automatic weapons and, therefore, probably his ministry is unable to deal with these people. If the government has dealt with Shifta, who were many in numbers and also very powerful, why not these few poachers?52
120. In early 1975, then Vice President Daniel arap Moi declared that “no effort will be spared to stamp [poaching] out”.53 Three years later, President Kenyatta banned all forms of hunting.
121. The second branch of Shifta violence to elicit a reaction from the government was violence aimed directly at government employees, property, installations and the like. Like poaching, such attacks were depicted as intolerable. During the war, strikes against the government were, of course, deliberate. The post-war situation was much more opportunistic. Government convoys, for instance, were a favourite target. If the raiders were lucky, the cars might be carrying civil servants’ salaries. So it was in 1989 in Hulugho, a tiny Garissa town, when three policemen were killed while transporting the payroll. While not unusual, such incidents had the capacity to both shock and anger the administration. And as Hulugho again shows, fairly determined attempts were made to track down bandits involved in such incidents.