By Salah Abdi Sheikh
One of the most intriguing stories about Wagalla Massacre was the extent to which it was planned and implemented. The target community was collected from all the three districts and detained at Wagalla Airstrip.
Abdullahi, my old uncle who left Wajir District in 1965 when the Kenya Army killed all his family’s herd of 200 camels, had established himself in Madogashe in Garissa District. On the morning of 9th Feb 1984 he was at Jalaqo, about 30 miles from Modogashe on the road to Garissa, in a shallow well with other men busy filling troughs with water for his livestock when a column of army vehicles arrived.
The soldiers asked them which clan of Somali Abdullahi and his colleagues were and innocently they replied Degodia. They were arrested and taken to Habaswein police post overnight and were driven to Wagalla Airstrip the next morning.
Abdullahi and seven others were taken to Wagalla and witnessed the atrocities first hand. In his late 80s today uncle Abdullahi has had a very long life but he avoids Wajir like plague. He has lived in Isiolo, Garissa and Tana River but nobody has been able to convince him to go back to Wajir.
The stories told of Wagalla Massacre demonstrate a wider conspiracy to commit genocide. Wagalla was never about the immediate security concerns of Wajir District. It had nothing to do with the low-level clan conflict between Somali clans; such conflicts have been simmering since the beginning of time and had never resulted in genocide.
Wagalla was a classic extermination of a people; it implementation of a policy that began at independence that was aimed at clearing the inhabitants out of their land and pushing them out of the map of Kenya. It was the policy set by Kenyatta and inherited by Moi. It is a policy practiced by low level government authorities who issue official documents and by the remnants of provincial administration.
In the last 5 decades Kenya has thrown every pot, pan and toilet sink at Kenyan Somalis but like a pervasive fungi Somalis seemed to thrive against all odds.
We have not arrived yet until we resolve the past injustices, until we regain the dignity as human beings, until we are allowed to be all equal as citizens. We are not going anywhere, the era of irredentism is over; we aspire, desire and intend to play the game as Kenyans with equal rights and responsibilities under the new constitution.
We want the Government of Kenya of Kenya to provide reparations to the victims; reparations are not just compensation but the whole healing process. We ask the Government to implement the TJRC Report.
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Prof. Salah Abdi Sheikh is an aspiring governor for Wajir County
