This was the BBC’s report on the 5th of November 2014: “a moderate Muslim cleric has been shot dead by gunmen in the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa, police say. Salim Bakari Mwarangi, a vocal critic of Somalias al-Shabab Islamist group, was shot after evening prayers on Tuesday, the citys police chief said. The BBCs Robert Kiptoo in Mombasa says he had received death threats from those who accused him of being too close to the government. More than 21 Islamic clerics have been gunned down. They have been killed in this sequence: 4 November 2014: Salim Bakari Mwarangi, 11 July 2014: Shahid Bhat, 10 June 2014: Sheikh Mohammed Idriss, 1 April 2014: Sheikh Makaburi, 28 January 2014: Ahmed Abdalla Bakshueni, 6 December 2013: Sheikh Suleiman Mwayuyu, 3 December 2013: Faiz Mohammed Rufai, 27 June 2013: Salim Mohammed Nero, 27 June 2013: Kassim Omollo , 29 October 2012: Omar Faraj and Titus Nabiswa, 27 August 2012: Sheikh Aboud Rogo , 13 April 2012: Sheikh Samir Khan, 10 April 2012: Sheikh Mohammed Kassim. While civil society and human rights activists have always called for investigations into these killings the police have always maintained the obvious rhetoric “we have launched investigations to this matter” and nothing often comes out of the said investigations. It is interesting that in the list of those who have been killed are both radical and moderate clerics. While on the one hand the moderate ones are often a soft target of the radical Islamic groups such as the Alshabaab that has accuses them of being pro-government, it is on the other hand difficult to piece together the killing of the said radical clerics in the Kenyan coast. Again while the Kenyan government has often denied any extra judicial summary of radical clerics, this does not in any way exonerate the GoK of culpability since indeed if it is as a result of common crime that we are losing the clerics, then the Kenyan security forces stand to blame for such deaths since they have failed to protect the clerics.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Nov 2014 08:33:28 +0000
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