The threat of terrorist attacks

Ever since Uganda deployed its troops to Somalia, it was clear that it might become a target for terrorist attacks. The 2008 State Department Country Reports on Terrorism, for example, warned that extremists moving between the Horn of Africa and North Africa and Europe used Uganda as a transit point [Department of State 2008]. The report went on to say, that, while in transit, the extremists were believed to have illegally purchased government documents and engaged in recruitment activities in Uganda. In response, the government of Uganda continued efforts to track, capture, and hold individuals with suspected links to terrorist organizations. In October 2008, the government put Kampala on high alert and increased security at government installations, popular shopping centers, and other soft targets. Unlike Kenya, Uganda was better prepared for the fight against terrorists, for it had passed a comprehensive Anti-terrorism Act in 2002.

Because of the deployment of AMISOM, al-Shabaab has frequently threatened Uganda with retaliation, just like it has threatened Kenya and Ethiopia. On 21 June 2009, for example, when the TFG was pleading for help, the Islamists sent a clear signal to neighboring countries. “We are sending our clear warning to the neighboring countries.... Send your troops to our holy soil if you need to take them back inside coffins," Shebab spokesman Sheik Ali Mohamed Rage told a press conference in Mogadishu. "We tell you that our dogs and cats will enjoy eating the dead bodies of your boys if you try to respond to the calls of these stooges, because we wish to die in the way of Allah more than you wish to live," he added.”²⁶³

In September 2009, Museveni mooted the idea that AMISOM peacekeepers should deploy to Kismayo and Baidoa as well. In response, Sheikh Mahad Omar, the leader of al-Shabaab in Bay and Bakool regions, told protestors that al-Shabaab will fight AMISOM if they deploy in Kismayo or Baidoa "like we are fighting Ugandan and Burundian soldiers in Mogadishu." Al-Shabaab fighters then made a public display of shooting at large photographs of Somali President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, Ethiopian

263 AFP: „Somalia Islamists warn against foreign intervention”

Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and Ugandan President Museveni.²⁶⁴ In response, the Ugandan government raised alert levels and increased security at government installations, popular shopping centers, hotels, and other soft targets in September. This was repeated after similar threats in November and December as well [Department of State 2009].

Further threats were issued in October 2009 in response to a rocket attack by AMISOM in Mogadishu, in which 30 people were killed. Al-Shabaab insurgents said they will strike the capitals of Burundi and Uganda in revenge: "We shall make their people cry,"

Sheikh Ali Mohamed Hussein, the rebel’s self-styled governor of Banadir region, which includes Mogadishu, told reporters. "We shall attack Bujumbura and Kampala...We will move our fighting to those two cities and we shall destroy them!”²⁶⁵

These threats clearly rang the alarm bells in Kampala, which hosts a sizeable Somali minority of about 20, 000 people. In response to the threats, a joint force from the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI), Internal Security Organisation (ISO) and the Joint anti-terrorism squad (JAAT) deployed in Kisenyi, a Kampala suburb with a large Somali minority. “We are not taking these threats lightly, that is why we are beefing up security. We shall, as promised by President Museveni, repulse any attacks by the insurgents”, a military spokesperson said, adding, that all mosques in the country were under surveillance [Africa Research Bulletin 2009/10].

The Somalia diaspora in Kampala, mindful of its delicate situation, wowed to identify and hand over to the security authorities any suspicious person. "We ran away from the war and left them there. We are now living in peace. We are ready to die for peace,"

said Roble Abdulayi, the Somali community deputy chairperson. He urged the security agencies to use the Somalis at the various border and airport entry points to identify the insurgents. "It is us the Somalis who know these people. Most penetrate through the

264 Garowe Online: „Baidoa protestors burn Uganda president's picture”, 27 September 2009, http://www.garoweonline.com/artman2/publish/Somalia_27/Somalia_Baidoa_protestors_burn_

Uganda_president_s_picture_printer.shtml

265 Reuters: „Somalia's Shabaab rebels threaten Uganda, Burundi”, 23 October 2009, http://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFJOE59M04620091023

various porous borders at Busia and Malaba. Use us to track them," said Roble.”²⁶⁶ Nevertheless, there was some anxiousness on the part of the Somalis because of the deployment of a large number of antiterrorist units on the streets of their neighborhood, as the Ugandan special forces are notorious for their brutal use of force.²⁶⁷

The first concrete information about al-Shabaab activity in Uganda surfaced a couple of day later, on 8 November 2009. Sources within the Joint Anti-Terrorism squad told the New Vision newspaper that three British nationals of Somali descent are suspected to have sneaked into the country in the previous weeks. General David Tinyefuza, the coordinator of the intelligence agencies said that, in the face of the threats, the agencies were following a three-pronged strategy. They were strengthening the capability of the security systems, intensifying coordination and information exchange with international allies and increasing mobilization. “He noted that the police had been issuing terror alerts to the public, transport organisations as well as hotels.”²⁶⁸ Tinyefuza should have noted a fourth component: the increased controlling and surveillance of the Somalis in Uganda. In November, Uganda quickly registered all Somalis living in the country, 20,000 in total.²⁶⁹

Even more worrying was another piece of information, which surfaced at the beginning of December 2009: apparently, there were Ugandans among the al-Shabaab militants fighting in Somalia. AMISOM spokesperson Major Bahoku Barigye revealed that he talked to three Ugandan al-Shabaab fighters who issued threats against him, claiming that they knew his whereabouts and those of his relatives in Kampala. He said the three spoke Luganda, Kifumbira and Iteso (languages spoken by Ugandan tribes) respectively.²⁷⁰ He said one of the Ugandans told him he was a member of the Alliance

266 New Vision: „Somalis screened over terror threats”, 25 October 2009, http://www.newvision.co.ug/PA/8/12/699081

267 Shabelle: „Somali Refugee - 'We Are Very Worry About Ugandan Troops Deployed to Our Neighborhoods in Kampala'”, 27 October 2009, http://allafrica.com/stories/200910271112.html

268 New Vision: „Security hunts for Somali terrorists”, 8 November 2009, http://www.newvision.co.ug/D/8/12/700529

269 New Vision: „Uganda registers Somali refugees”, 14 November 2009,

http://www.sundayvision.co.ug/detail.php?mainNewsCategoryId=7&newsCategoryId=128&ne wsId=701170

270 New Vision: "Somali militants recruit Ugandans”, 2 December 2009, http://www.newvision.co.ug/PA/8/12/703060

Democratic Forces (ADF), a rebel group formed in the 1990s by mainly Muslim Ugandans (about the ADF, see below).

That the Ugandan security forces were up to their task to defend their country from terrorist attacks was being seriously questioned in March 2010, when reports surfaced, that Hashi Hussein Farah, an al-Shabaab terrorist and fundraiser was in the country.

(Farah was wanted by the Australian police for planning an attack in Melbourne. He had a KSh7 million bounty on his head at the time of his arrest by the Kenyan police last month). In a slightly confusing story, it seems that in March 2010 Kenyan authorities arrested Farah at the Kenyan-Ugandan border town of Busia. Before that, he reportedly lived in Uganda for a year.²⁷¹ Farah, however, managed to escape from his Kenyan detention, and slipped back to Uganda, where he was finally arrested a couple of days later.²⁷²

This incident raised several questions about the fitness of the Ugandan (and Kenyan) security forces: how was it possible, that Farah crossed to Uganda in the first place?

How was it then possible, that he stayed in the country for a year? After arrested, how could he escape from the Kenyan detention? And finally: how could he then slip back to Uganda and on to Kampala without problems? Even more worrying were the circumstances of his arrest in Kampala on 2 April 2010. According to The Independent newspaper, Hashi Hussein Farah was arrested with “a dozen others” by the Joint Anti-terrorism Taskforce (JATT) in Kisenyi slum in Kampala, possibly giving credence to claims that al-Shabaab terrorists have cells in Uganda.²⁷³ Only a couple of months later, these claims turned out to be tragically valid.