Security officers keep guard at along the Lamu Kiunga road within the Boni forest. [Photo/ The Star/ Alphonce Gari]
There is a group of violent men in Lamu west area that is behaving exactly like Somali-based Al Shabaab militants — attacking residents at night and butchering non-Muslim men they find. The attacks of the group, which have become frequent in the recent past, can easily be mistaken to be those of the terrorists. Except that they are not, our investigations reveal.In the early hours of Friday night, last week, there was a deadly attack in the villages of Witu area, Lamu west. The ambush, which police immediately said was by Al Shabaab militants, saw at least three men beheaded. Witnesses — who cannot be named because of their safety — say the attackers, about 200 men, were armed with arrows and machetes when they launched the midnight break-in into homes of the unsuspecting locals. They cut the throats of any man Christian man found, sources say. Four men were killed that night, with one missing. Residents fear he was taken away and killed faraway in the forest. What stopped more people from being killed was the screaming of residents in the first house, where a form three student and his uncle were killed. When others knew of the attack, they fled their homes. “After the alarm was raised, homeguards in the area fired four bullets, driving the attackers away,” a source said. Residents interviewed said the attacks are motivated by land conflicts between farmers and pastoralists in Lamu west, and that it is men from the area who plan and carry out the massacres of their village mates. “The land at the centre of this conflict is a scheme (a large settlement land from the colonial era) which all residents got a piece of,” a resident said. “What the men want is to drive away the non-Muslim residents, who have lived here for decades and legally own the plots, so that they can use the land to graze their livestock,” the source added.Sometimes, the local attackers are joined by men from as far as Garissa, Wajir and Isiolo, our investigations showed. In the recent past, four attacks of this manner have been conducted, but police are yet to prosecute anyone, making many locals to fear that the onslaught will intensify if nothing is done.“The people who take part in the attacks are well-known here in Witu and Kasakairu areas. Yet police are yet to arrest them. We ask the government to address the animosity between farmers and pastoralists for peace to be restored.”