Looting has been going on before your very eyes for ever so why the anger?

You wonder how a grown man (or woman) can wake up in the morning with nothing else on his mind but reaping where he has not sown. This is the image that many no doubt have when we see poor villagers on our TV’s looting from an overturned vehicle with no care of the consequences to life or limb should the cargo being looted be a consignment of highly flammable fuel. It is probably the same thought we have when we see people armed with machetes and knives hacking away at the dead carcass of a hippo or any other wild animal unfortunate enough to have been killed in a populated area.

So KDF soldiers have supposedly been caught on camera and CCTV looting Westgate Mall as the operation to free the mall from the (innumerable) terrorists and to locate any surviving hostages continued into the fourth day in September 2103. What’s the big deal about that? If the recent report of the unaccounted for billions of Kenya Shillings by the Auditor General in the last financial year is anything to go by why aren’t we as incensed with this looting of public funds (about a quarter of the annual budget) as we are with what happened at Westgate? Is it because the theft of the Kshs. 300 Billion was not captured on camera and on CCTV and therefore remains just a dubious report by the Auditor General?

Without seeming to sound callous about those business people whose livelihoods have now been lost forever forcing many to start from scratch, what is so different between the looting at the Westgate Mall and the systemic and systematic looting of public funds that has taken place in Kenya over the last 50 years?

The history of Kenya is replete with incidences of public looting at a scale that would put the Westgate looting to shame and even more callously by those entrusted as custodians of the public wealth, some of whom still hold public office as well as some whose presence is no longer evident in the public eye but who still continue to flout their ill-gotten wealth from the proceeds of the public purse.

It is just scandalous how people who were struggling to make a living before entering politics and public service are suddenly awash with cash and unaccounted for billions in assets in their portfolios while the ‘hoi polloi’ continue to suffer the indignity of lack of schools and hospitals and other indicators of economic well-being that should have been paid for with their taxes but which have been diverted to someone’s pocket. Many of the past scandals have had a severe knock on effect on the economy of the country as it is today and to date no one has been punished for their gluttony and unbridled looting of public funds. In China lesser scandals would have resulted in public executions!!

It is my view that the alleged looting that happened at Westgate (that has so vehemently been denied by the army top brass) is nothing but a microcosm of what we as Kenyans have been witness to in the last 50 years. Those at the top, who have benefitted from the largesse of the public, have always no doubt considered themselves a sophisticated lot, plotting to steal from the public coffers through dubious scandals and inflated allowances but all along believing that they are not thieves as they have not been caught with their fingers in the cookie jar. When such criminal deeds go unpunished for such a long time why wouldn’t the same attitude trickle down to the masses to loot something every now and then when the opportunity presents itself secure in the knowledge that you will not be caught?

I am with the army top brass on this one, their soldiers did not loot and that CCTV footage is just a photo shopped video being circulated by Al Shabbab to discredit the KDF further……….or I just need my eyes examined!! But seriously though we should be more outraged at the blatant looting of the public purse that has been going on for the past half century then with an isolated and unverified incident that happened at Westgate because we have been consigned to the unenviable tag of a third world country when we should have long ago been a BRIC(K)S country if only we had not hired looters and plunderers to manage and control our public coffers.

Suspicious characters lurk everywhere I look:

I have recently read a leaked report prepared by the National Security Intelligence Services (NSIS) which amongst others warned of an imminent terrorist attack on diverse dates between 5th – 21st September, that eventually panned out with the Westgate attack. The leak coming so soon after Westgate and the hammering that the intelligence community in Kenya has taken for seeming laxity on the job, it is rather obvious who the source of the leak was but that is the subject for another day. The report concluded that Kenyans were not aware of and did not report anything suspicious and hence it occurs to me that we need some education on what constitutes suspicious characters, behaviors and so on.

Ever since the Westgate attack, I am seeing suspicious characters lurking at every corner. Or is it just my over fertile imagination working overtime with a previously unknown zealousness to spot anything suspicious? I am seeing them as they drive past me in their heavily tinted cars, leaf and coil springs sagging under the weight of something unseen but obviously heavy. I am seeing them as they carry their backpacks and rucksacks contents hidden from prying eyes and I am also seeing them as they push heavily laden ‘mkokotenis’ and bicycles along our roads.

I am also seeing suspicious characters as they drive their pickups and trucks past me the mysterious cargo in their truck beds covered in a tarpaulin or protected by a closed container. Could it be that under that load of whatever they are carrying there could be a cache of arms or explosives? I see them in their sand carrying trucks under which sand could be a lethal dose of RDX, TNT or any other explosive or chemical weapon ready to blow up innocent Kenyans at its next stop.I also see them idly standing at street corners waiting for God knows what, as well as at the entrances to construction sites. But hang on could they just be job seekers waiting for that all-important masonry job or even plain clothes policemen keeping an eye out for security reasons?

I see them as they leave their bulging bags at the left luggage counters of the supermarket and I see them as they go about the business of nation building striding from one side of the city to the other surely on a surveillance mission and I also see them at the Mpesa agent and at the ATM points withdrawing or depositing money for their nefarious purposes. I see them in that primary school boy who looks older than an ordinary 13 year old should look school bag slung over his shoulder trying to look innocuous and I see them with a sling around their arm or a bandage across their skulls for surely they must have received those injuries as they threw their grenades and shot at those battle hardened women and children at Westgate.

I see them with a bulge somewhere in the region of their armpit for surely that is a holstered firearm ready to dispatch me to my maker. Or surely that person in the hardware store purchasing nails and fertilizer can only be doing it to construct a fertilizer bomb as effective as any explosive when mixed in the correct ratio of ingredients.

Or what of those ‘burkha’ and ‘buibui’ clad ladies? Surely that one walks like a man masquerading as a woman so as to escape my eagle eye as he surveys where next to strike. What about that car left by the roadside so close to that petrol station? It can only mean one thing, a possible carload of explosives about to be blown up and the proximity to the petrol station will add fuel to the fire and the subsequent havoc.

I see suspicious characters everywhere just waiting to unleash mayhem and terror on me and the rest of the Kenyans for we have been promised fire and brimstone and a bloody war by Al-Shabab if the Kenya Defence Forces do not exit Somalia immediately so that they can continue with their reign of terror and continue to collect illegal taxes from a ravaged people to finance their heinous campaigns of horror as they enforce their own brand of sharia law.

But what can I do since I am ill trained to know what is or is not suspicious as I have been told countless times by the police officers and now by the NSIS. Should I report all my suspicions to them? What if we all report our suspicions to the police? Are they equipped to handle all such reports that we make to them? If they dedicate the entire police force to handle suspicious reports will they really get anything else done and will they really manage to sieve facts from fiction and from personal vendetta and pure biases among people?

I agree that we all need to be aware of what constitutes a suspicious ………………….....anything but do we have the resources to manage the whole process?