Kenya's Somalia operation hits at humanitarian aid

Roger Middleton, a Horn of Africa specialist at the British think tank Chatham House, says that the Kenyan military operation puts obvious constraints on continued foreign aid operations and on efforts to secure the release of those foreigners who have been kidnapped.

“The access of international NGOs was not particularly great before the Kenyan incursion, and now it’s even less so,” says Mr. Middleton. With most foreign aid groups now out of southern Somalia, most aid work is being conducted by smaller Somali groups, funded by members of the Somali diaspora, but even these groups are finding difficulty getting clearance to bring in truckloads of food and other goods across the Kenyan border, for fear that they might be supplying Al Shabab, he says.

As for kidnap victims, their situation has become ever more precarious. “The best scenario would be if they have been taken by criminal groups who want money for their release,” says Middleton. Given Shabab’s silence about the kidnappings, Middleton finds it “unlikely” that they had a role in the matter. “If they had a role, I would have thought they would have made a big show of it.”

Far from the battlefield, the Kenyan tourist haven of Lamu – famous for its white sand beaches, warm aquamarine waters, and rich Swahili culture – has been rendered a ghost town by the kidnappings and the conflict.

Usually the months between July and April are peak tourist times in Lamu, with hundreds of Italian, British and German tourists taking charter flights to drink in the Kenyan sunshine. But these days, resorts are empty. Some have shut their doors and gone out of business.

“Most tourists have cancelled their bookings, while others have put their travel to the area on hold,” says Mohammed Ali Abubakar, director of Msafini hotel on Lamu’s Shella beach. “We have sent most of the workers home since we cannot afford to pay them and there is not much to do. We don’t know for how (much) longer this will go on, given that Kenyan soldiers have entered Somalia fighting the militias.”

Hamid Mohammed, manager of the nearby Jannatani Hotel, says he is woried.

“For the last three weeks we have had no visitor, apart from yesterday where two guests walked in,” he says. Security has been beefed up, he adds, with helicopter patrols and Kenyan navy boats on patrol along the beach. But even so, he’s seen his hotel go from 70% capacity to nearly zero. “The beach is almost empty apart from a few local whites who go for a walk during the morning hours.”

The patrols actually end up scaring the locals, Mr. Mohammed says. “The locals here almost (all) know each other. We are not used to this kind of police presence.”

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