How many Oliachas are among us?
By SARA BAKATA
Posted Saturday,
Posted Saturday,
As the Kenyan military incursion into Somalia enters its third week, it’s the happenings inside Kenya that have raised more questions than answers.
Elgiva Bwire Oliacha, the self-confessed al Shabaab member, will spend the rest of his life behind bars for planning and executing the two grenade attacks in Nairobi.
Mr Oliacha was so calm at his arrest, was even serene in the dock and expressed a degree of happiness at being handed the harshest sentence by a court of law. That was very unnerving.
Like he lived for just that moment. When all of us realise that al Shabaab is alive and living among us incognito.
This man had even attended the Mashujaa Day celebrations at Nyayo Stadium on October 20.
This man had been living and moving among us since he became indoctrinated with the murderous ideology of al Shabaab, probably since way back in 2007 as his mother assumes.
How many Oliacha’s are out there? Was he in a one-man cell? Where and how did he get his tools of trade to the densely populated residential area where he claimed to live?
Where is the wife he supposedly was to introduce to his mother?
Where in Mombasa was he staying, with whom and doing what in all the time he claimed he was there as his family reported him missing?
As the Kenya Military fights its way deep into Somalia, Kenyans would like to believe that the capture of Oliacha is the breakthrough our intelligence has been waiting for to connect the dots and smoke out other “unlikely” cell members.
Of course there is concern that as the army advances towards Kismayu, it did not sweep out the enemy in its wake. Kenyans are still being ambushed and killed in that treacherous part of the country.
Does it mean the army drove past Garissa and its outskirts, to Dadaab and Liboi and entered Somalia and left no other personnel from say the no-nonsense General Service Unit to keep the peace?
I understand why the taking of Kismayu is significant at this point, since it will cut off the financial base and supply lines to al Shabaab further inland. But our military can do better than this.
After all, no one said Kismayu will fall in a month, and then there is the bigger matter of securing it and handing it over to a Nairobi-friendly group.
This calls for multi-tasking on the part of the security personnel. Secure the area you have passed through too or how else will you return home after liberating Kismayu? Or is that not in the cards?
Sara Bakata is the deputy chief sub-editor, The EastAfrican sbakata@ke.nationmedia.com
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