Crime Spike
Armed violence kills nearly 1,000 people each day across Africa, and the US Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya noted a spike in violent crimes, often perpetrated late at night, particularly in Nairobi, Mombasa, and Kisumu. US citizens in Nairobi have reported nearly a dozen criminal incidents to the Embassy in the course of two weeks in August. Assailants often lie in wait in shrubbery and overwhelm blocked vehicles at gates or expatriate as they attempt to enter their homes. Some of the home invasions reportedly resembled security force operations and went unnoticed by complicit or lethargic security guards. Weapons are ubiquitous from neighboring countries’ civil wars, especially that of Somalia. While urban areas experience a spike in crime, the rural areas?less frequented by expatriates and foreigners–are no less vulnerable to banditry and violent crime.
Highway robbers with machetes stabbed Russian Ambassador Valery Yegoshkin in the back and robbed him during the day of August 22 when he stopped to check on an ill child passenger. Yegoshkin was driving with his military attach?, who also sustained injuries, and three children when he was assaulted. Similarly, in early August, Kersten Schack, a Danish embassy staffer, sustained injury to his eye when he and his family were attacked at a hotel in Naivasha, and in 2005, the Danish Ambassador was robbed on his first day on the job. Even two Kenyan Cabinet members and a Member of Parliament were victimized by robbers. The Kenyan government has vowed to provide convoy security for the foreign diplomatic corps, although this could put them in a more vulnerable position. Attacks on high profile targets serve to underscore how vulnerable they, the business community, and even the ordinary citizen are to crime and thuggery.
Travel Dangers
Carjackings
Expats must conduct counter-surveillance and vary their routes consistently to avoid victimization, as many criminals carjack and rob their victims of jewelry and electronics, occasionally shooting their victims. Further, passengers should never drive with open windows or unlocked door, as carjackings are crimes of opportunity. Car keys should be kept separate from home/office keys, which should only be carried when necessary.
Driving Conditions and Culture
Non-essential night driving should be avoided. An emerging trend involves aggressive drivers who sideswipe vehicles in order to bait the victimized driver to exit his vehicle and fall pray to waiting thugs. Road safety is problematic; rules of the road and speed limits are nonexistent. The matatus, shared taxis, are particularly perilous as was witnessed in an August 20 accident in which a US citizen was killed and three others severely injured in a head-on collision with one.
Police
Kenyan police may be of little help in thwarting crime; rather, some are themselves complicit. The Nation reported that police complicity may be an effort to sack Police Commissioner Mohamed Hussein Ali. Traffic police have recently come under fire for stopping vehicles for allegedly speeding and demanding bribes as publicly highlighted both by the detention of a World Bank executive and bribery demands made on a pastor. However, matatus make up a majority, upward of 90 percent, of the bribery demands. According to AllAfrica, “that the Kenya Police is ridden with corrupt officers is not in question,” and many recruits apply to the traffic division because “that is where the money is.” This tradition is unlikely to change: “There is no honor in being a moral corruption-free traffic police officer. An honest policeman working in an environment full of corrupt officers?will die a most frustrated officer in a corrupt country?”
Tourist Destinations Not Exempt
While crime is uncommon at the country’s famed reserves and safari sites, it is not exempt. Six men armed with AK-47s and machetes and seemingly Masai tribesmen?elongated earlobes and traditional red cloaks–robbed two British couples on safari at the luxury Mara Porinin Camp near the Masai Mara reserve, a leading tourist destination, in late August of their valuables. One staff member was taken hostage at gunpoint. The gunmen approached a third tent but were dissuaded when the hostage indicated armed police were nearby. In 2005, two Japanese tourists were injured in an armed ambush by bandits. Samburu National Park and various exclusive golf courses have also reported similar incidents.
Conclusion
When billboards warning of rape and carjacking are omnipresent, indeed, security conditions in and around “Nairoberry” should be considered bad. Criminals are increasingly emboldened by the relative ease to acquire small arms, economic disparities, high unemployment and crime rates, and social inequalities. This, in turn, has given way to vigilantism, mob justice, and punitive retribution; violence begets violence. These societal conditions do not appear to be abating, and the security forces and the judicial system are hardly adequate to reign in criminality. Businessmen traveling to Nairobi should receive advanced situational briefings and countermeasure training to avoid falling victim to the crime wave.
