Nkaissery, democracy is not the root of terrorism

Interior Cabinet Secretary Major General (Rtd) Joseph Nkaissery. FILE PHOTO | DIANA NGILA | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

In Summary

• The terrorists of the princely states in Renaissance Italy — which relied on mercenaries to fight their wars — were themselves rogue mercenaries, often those owed money by their princely paymasters.
• Driving cars makes us vulnerable but drunk driving, speeding, recklessness and poor roads, not cars, are the things that cause death.
• Innocent civilians are not killed by constitutional freedoms but by terrorists: interdiction strategy and tactics should focus on them, not on the freedoms of their victims.

By WACHIRA MAINA
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Last week, Major-General (Rtd) Joseph Nkaissery, Cabinet Secretary for Interior and Coordination of National Government, told a meeting in Washington that democracy is making Kenya vulnerable to terror attacks.

But as is often the case with these things, he is making a true but trivial point. Mobile telephones, banks and the Internet also make Kenya vulnerable to terror attacks. Come to think of it, free trials also make it likely that some crooks won’t be punished. Should we abolish these things too to secure Kenya from terrorists?

The point is that terrorists will always exploit the systems in place to hurt us: The real issue is what we can do to stop them. By asking the wrong question, the CS is likely to adopt the wrong strategy; undermine the Bill of Rights; limit democratic space and increase police presence in everyday life.

In the short run, such measures may seem to work but they eventually increase national vulnerability. There are four reasons why this is so.

First, even though the type of terror threat we face is unique to our times, terrorism itself is neither new nor unique: The Government should not treat it as if it were. From the princely states of Renaissance Italy to the nation-states of the 20th century, terrorism has been a fact of political life.

As Philip Bobbit notes in Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty First Century, a study of the evolution of terrorism down the ages, Salafist terror groups — such as al-Shabaab and Islamic State — are, in fact, a form of terrorism unique to the globalised, market-driven world of the 21st century.

These groups are anti-democracy, anti-secularism and are opposed to the universality of rights. They are also diffuse, globally networked, flexible and adept at using the tools of globalisation — the Internet, jetliner, the financial system and the 24-hour TV station.

ISLAMIC STATE

Because they are also non-hierarchical and decentralised, they can survive the killing of their leaders or even elimination in one part of the world.

The waning of Al-Qaeda has opened the space for Islamic State, whose own eclipse will inevitably open space for yet another. This protean character is a warning: force and legal lock-down of the type the government has tried with the security laws won’t work.

Terror groups adopt the structures — but not the values — of regimes they fight against. The terrorists of the princely states in Renaissance Italy — which relied on mercenaries to fight their wars — were themselves rogue mercenaries, often those owed money by their princely paymasters. Thus, in 1527 the unpaid 20,000 strong, largely protestant, mercenary army of Charles V sacked Rome, terrorised civilians, depopulated it through violence and humiliated and tortured the clergy, including future Pope Julius III.

Likewise, the terrorists who fought the monarchical state in the 19th century: That state financed itself, at least partly, by looting its overseas possessions. The terrorists who fought it, the buccaneers, also profiteered by predation on poorly defended coastal cities and bullion ships. In Tortuga in Haiti, they even assembled an “armada the size of a state navy” in 1655.

And so it is too that the globally networked, market-driven, decentralised state of the 21st Century has also generated terrorist groups that are, like the state itself, networked, able to buy the tools of death from the market place and globally decentralised.

Second, the government must understand that though freedom makes us vulnerable, it does not cause terrorism. Driving cars makes us vulnerable but drunk driving, speeding, recklessness and poor roads, not cars, are the things that cause death.

SERIOUS CULPRIT

Innocent civilians are not killed by constitutional freedoms but by terrorists: interdiction strategy and tactics should focus on them, not on the freedoms of their victims. The attacks in Mpeketoni in Lamu and the two in Mandera would have happened even without a new Constitution.

And a closer look at Westgate shows that corruption is probably a more serious culprit in that attack than democracy.

It is easy to see why the theory that democracy causes terrorism seems intuitively correct. Democracy rests on freedom from surveillance, freedom of association and freedom of movement, all liberties that give terrorists the space to operate. That however is no different from mobile phones that make life easier for all, terrorists included.

Yet, it is important to see why undermining democracy will not eliminate terrorists. A comparison with the guerilla armies that fought against colonialism will help. Freedom fighters used violence — even terror methods — to gain a voice in the political system. Thus, neither the African National Congress nor the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frelimo) used violence to abolish democracy. Instead, they challenged the colonial definition of democracy which was based on a racial franchise: for them violence was a means to a political settlement and inclusion.

Salafist groups, on the other hand, challenge not our definition of democracy but democracy itself. They use violence to destroy the foundations of the modern, democratic secular state.
As one Al-Qaeda ideologue, Abu Bakr Naji is quoted by Bobbit as saying, the objective of extremist violence is three-fold. First, to convince citizens the government is weak and unable to protect them.

Second, given that a weak government is also likely to resort to strong measures, they want to force governments into repressive policies. Third, they hope the resulting repression can then be funnelled into ever increasing official savagery.

MOBILISE SUPPORT

The resulting loss of control and breakdown creates an environment in which extremists can mobilise support from a desperate and insecure public, as was the case in Afghanistan before the Taliban and Somalia, before the Islamic Court Union.

This means that to junk democracy in favour of more muscular policies, as Nkaissery hints at, would only create the very conditions terrorists want.

Third, terror groups do not merely want to kill many people, they also want many people to be watching. The more theatrical and vivid they can make their “drama of death”, the more effective their communication. Paradoxically, the more secure the government claims its citizens to be, the more dramatic a successful attack will be.

In other words, when the government imposes tighter and unreasonable controls, it gives the terrorists a greater PR cachet when the attack happens. This is not to say that government should not enact policies to strengthen policing. It should. But it must remember that law and force are blunt instruments for fighting terror.

The reality is that there are demographic and socio-economic drivers of desperation and radicalisation. These are grazing grounds for terrorists.

Today, Kenya’s unemployment rate tops 40 per cent and is compounded by a high age dependence ratio — defined as the ratio of dependent people — younger than 15 and older than 64 — to the working age population, that is, those who are between 15 and 64. This is not just a source of social stress: A desperate population is easy prey to radicalisation.

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Perhaps the growing atavism and parochialism of the demonstrations that are now routine in Kenya should be a warning. This means that an anti-terror strategy based on weakening democracy will only stoke domestic violence without staving off Al-Shabaab.

Fourth, it is easy to be cynical about Nkaissery’s claim. Is the government genuinely confused whether democracy encourages terror or is it deliberately fudging the difference between its political objectives — to stay in power beyond 2017 — and the objectives of the state — to keep the public safe from both internal and external dangers?

The truth is that democracy and freedom are only a “danger”’ to a government at an election. A government headed into an election may begin to see threats to its power as a threat to the state.

Opportunistically, it may then deliberately conflate the struggle against its political opponents with the fight against the enemies of the state. It may then begin to see the tools that its needs to fight its domestic opponents — such as media controls or laws that restrict civic institutions — as the right weapons for fighting the enemies of the state, terror groups, for example.

What is Nkaissery to do then? Rather than invest his energies and those of the government talking up the perils of democracy, he needs a clear, long-range anti-terrorism strategy. That strategy must address the factors that would make his work easier and Kenya safer: strengthen citizen involvement in policing; build national resilience to cope with attacks; refurbish the intelligence services; fight corruption in key institutions — immigration, intelligence and the police; enhance e-capabilities to access terror sites and communication infrastructure; improve financial transparency to stop money transfers; open channels with allies facing similar threats and communicate constantly and truthfully with the public.

Any time invested in impugning democracy and human rights is time wasted alienating the public.

Mr Maina is a constitutional lawyer