CITIZENS’ PERCEPTIONS ON THE EFFECTIVENESS OF COUNTER TERRORISM MECHANISMS USED BY THE GOVERNMENT: A CASE OF NORTHEASTERN REGION, KENYA
Abstract
Terrorism in Kenya in particular and the world in general has become a huge mysterious and unresolved phenomenon. It has given governments nightmares. It often shapes up and assumes the behavior of a chameleon and strikes from the least expected angle. Many people lost their lives here in Kenya and across the globe. A lot of resources and intelligence were applied by even the relatively most powerful nations in the world but could not eventually succeed. It is an emerging and evolving issue. Terrorists employ different strategies besides the traditional forms. For example on the Garrisa University attack during which 148 students were killed, Kenyan born nationals were used to carry out the attacks, one of the attackers being a law graduate from a local university. These new strategies increasingly show that terrorists are recruiting, training and executing attacks within Kenya mercilessly. In light of the above, this study was initiated to understand the various modalities the government uses to counter terrorism, seeks to review these strategies and suggest diversified, comprehensive, multidimensional and all-inclusive strategies of counter terrorism, in Kenya and the Horn of Africa. The study was carried out in the Northeastern counties of Mandera, Wajir and Garissa targeting 120 respondents. The respondents were randomly selected with adherence to the diversity in the population. The study found out that the strategies used by the government to combat terrorism is not effective and has not achieved its objectives. The government uses militaristic form which has made the residents not cooperate with the security apparatus. The research suggests that the government changes its tactics and makes it more participative and collaborative.
Article visualizations:
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Books
Hadji, A, & Hassan, N. (2016). The Role of CSOs in Countering Violent Extremism (CVE): A Case of actors in East African Region, East African publishers, Nairobi, Kenya.
Hassan, M. (2012). Understanding Drivers of Violent Extremism: The Case of al-Shabab and Somali Youth: CTC sentinel publishers, Mogadishu, Somalia.
Allawi, Ali A. (2007) The Occupation of Iraq: Winning the War, Losing the Peace. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Hoffman, Bruce, (1998). Inside Terrorism, Columbia University Press, Columbia, USA.
Hoorweg, J, Foeken, D & Obudho (2000), Kenya handbook: Culture, resources and development in the East Africa: East African publishers, Nairobi, Kenya.
Oloo, A. (2010). Marginalisation and the rise of militia groups in Kenya: the Mungiki and the Sabaot Land Defence Force. Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies.
Howard, T. (2014). Failed states and the origins of violence: A comparative analysis of state failure as a root cause of terrorism and political violence. New Edition Farnham Publishing, Ashgate.
Lind, J and Dowd, C. (2015). Understanding Insurgent Margins in Kenya, Nigeria and Mali In: Rapid Response Briefing. Brighton: Institute for Development Studies.
Journal articles
Khalil, J (2014). Radical Beliefs and Violent Actions are not synonymous. Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 37(2): 198–211, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2014.862902
Mercy Corps (2013). Examining the Links between Youth, Economic Opportunity, Civic Engagement, and Conflict, Available at http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PA00JGK6.pdf.
Chwartz, S et al. (2009). Terrorism: An Identity Theory Perspective. Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 32: 537–559, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10576100902888453
Venhaus, J, M. (2010). Why Youth Join al-Qaeda. Washington, D.C.: United States Institute for Peace. Available at http://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/SR236Venhaus.pdf
Rasmussen, J (2010). Mungiki as youth movement: Revolution, gender and generational politics in Nairobi, Kenya: Nordic Journal of Youth Research 18(3): 301–19, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/110330881001800304
Websites
Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims Strategic Plan and Transition from MDGS TO SDGS. (2015) Retrieved 30 July 2018, available at http://www.arcworld.org/downloads/SUPKEM.pdf
Garissa University attack (2015). Retrieved on 1st August 2018. Available at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garissa_University_College_attack
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejsss.v0i0.434
Copyright (c) 2018 Ahmed Osman Warfa, Salah Abdirahman Farah, Mohamed Mahat Ali
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The research works published in this journal are free to be accessed. They can be shared (copied and redistributed in any medium or format) and\or adapted (remixed, transformed, and built upon the material for any purpose, commercially and\or not commercially) under the following terms: attribution (appropriate credit must be given indicating original authors, research work name and publication name mentioning if changes were made) and without adding additional restrictions (without restricting others from doing anything the actual license permits). Authors retain the full copyright of their published research works and cannot revoke these freedoms as long as the license terms are followed.
Copyright © 2016 - 2023. European Journal Of Social Sciences Studies (ISSN 2501-8590) is a registered trademark of Open Access Publishing Group. All rights reserved.
This journal is a serial publication uniquely identified by an International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) serial number certificate issued by Romanian National Library. All the research works are uniquely identified by a CrossRef DOI digital object identifier supplied by indexing and repository platforms. All the research works published on this journal are meeting the Open Access Publishing requirements and standards formulated by Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002), the Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing (2003) and Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities (2003) and can be freely accessed, shared, modified, distributed and used in educational, commercial and non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Copyrights of the published research works are retained by authors.
