Wednesday 18th of May I spontaneously joined the public hearing of three witnesses on the Wagalla massacre. The week before I had read in the newspaper how in the early 80's two tribes were asked to hand in their weapons to the authorities in order to temper tensions between them. The Ajuran responded and handed in their weapons. The Degodia didn't. The Ajuran then felt betrayed by the government, as they were left an easy prey for the Degodia's. The Degodia's reportedly made use of this opportunity. The government decided to intervene in the situation. They spread the news that president Moi himself would visit the Degodia's to visit them. On the morning of the event they gathered on the Wagalla airstrip, where they were welcomed by Kenyan flags and a number of security forces. Soon the men were rounded up in the center of the airstrip and not allowed to leave.
The first witness, minister of development of North Eastern Elmi, told about his experiences during these days in February 1984. Soldiers identified in an area of 100's of kilometers Degodian men. Herdsmen were taken away from their herds, their livestock being left behind or confiscated. Minister Elmi saw several trucks with soldiers passing through the region to join the operation. Degodia property was burned. Degodia women were raped. At day two minister Elmi heard that people had been released. This later turned out to be a rumour, which had come into existence through the escape of some of the rounded-up men. Elmi and his friend sister Anna Lena decided to drive to the airstrip to see if they could help the supposedly released men. When they arrived and had gotten out of the car the security forces were surprised by their presence. They saw a pile of bodies. Two naked men were carrying yet another body towards the pile. Elmi witnessed how a young men left the crowd of Degodia in the center of the airstrip and ran out of desperate thirst towards a leaking waterpipe, from which water poured onto the ground. Two soldiers went after him and beated him until he ran back to the crowd. A boy, also desperately thirsty, told the forces that he had a gun hidden at home. They drove him to his place, where he jumped into the well and drank as much as he could. Out of the well he confessed to his guards that in fact he did not posess any gun. He was taken back to the airstrip and shot dead. Back in town they met one of the escaped men. His legs were burned. He declared that they, at arrival at the airstrip, were told to take of their clothes, which were piled up and set on fire. Some of the men, including him, were forced to stand on top of the burning pile of clothes, in order to get burned themselves. Elmi and sister Anna Lena went around to find as many of the escaped people as possible, and brought them to the hospital and Anna Lena's compound, where they expected them to be save.
The next day all men had either died or escaped. Many men were shot while they ran away. Elmi and Anna Lena went to the airstrip to collect bodies in order to bury them in mass graves. The police in town so far had denied that anything was happening in their region. Elmi deliberately dropped the bodies in front of the policestation. When it got dark and Elmi and Anna Lena had to cease their efforts, they took the mainroad to get home. Several ambushes had been set up, causing them to be taken by the police. They were beaten up and imprisoned for the night. In the morning the were released, but not allowed to continue the burial.
AMREF, OXFAM and EU countries were bound to supply essential goods to the hostel where many of the surviving Degodia stayed, but they were denied access. As a result many people died after the massacre. Elmi was arrested and taken to the security commission. They checked him on his knowledge about what had happened. He chose to downplay the numbers displayed in his memories, to prevent from being silenced himself. Probably the number of deaths will never be established. According to Elmi bodies have been dissolved chemically as well as hidden in the woods. The year after a biased commision investigated what happened, but the report never has been published.
It seems to have been a systematic and well-planned operation, which was well covered later. Whether there was actually searched for weapons among the Degodia is questionable. Houses had been set on fire with disabled children inside. This makes it likely that officials hadn't even searched for weapons before demolishment. Minister Elmi accounts that despite stories about some cruel forces, there were officials who tried to make the best of it as well.
The second witness had been organising famine relief in the North Eastern. He had visited Wajir just two days before the round-up, but heard about the massacre coincidentally just two years later. He supposedly had attended the meeting where decisions had been made on how to treat the Degodia's, but couldn't recall any specific details on this discussion. After all it was not his area of interest.
The third witness, famous radioman Fred Machoka, shed light on his time as a security force in Wajir. The situation had been extremely hard for them. It is a desertic area where hardly any communication was possible. There were shifta fighters, raiders, snakes and other wild animals. Servants could easily go crazy within six months. "You don't see nobody but strangers. You are being attacked. Everybody talks about Kenya as if it is another country. You eat wild fruits. You need to have been in the security forces to understand what it is like. It is not something for discussion." Their brief was to protect Kenyan Somali's from Somali Somali's. Obviously it was impossible to distinguish between these two groups on physical features, while people did not possess identity cards whatsoever. In fact they themselves, uniformed and from all over Kenya, were the strangers. The locals found it more than inappropriate that they supposedly were protected from their own brothers.
It was the time of the Shifta war. A Shifta warrior was defined as any person crossing the border from Somalia with cruel intentions. These had to be arrested and handed over to the police. Also there were mines, left by the Italians during the second world war.
Question: "residents of North Eastern feel they were deliberately attacked by uniformed people. Do you remember any such incidences?"
Machoka: "I can't recall any incidences during my time there ('73-'75). Only Wagalla, which took place more than 5 years later. I would only hear that the forces or the shifta fighters were being attacked. I want people to understand that in any institution there are good people and there are bad people. Security forces go through many problems. I lost friends and others got injured. In my opinion the government needs to do a lot of public relations along common borders. I think it is more of a diplomatic issue than a security issue. The people of Northern Kenya have been marginalised for far too long. The fact that the security forces are not from the local community is evil. That people struggle for years to get an identity card, sometimes dying before getting it, is evil. The government marginalises the most. People travel for days without water."
Question: "was there any support for people after serving in the security forces?"
Machoka: "no, we were left on our own."
Question: "people say they were denied water and food from the security forces. Do you remember any such instances during your time there?"
Machoka: "as security forces we would walk for several days from one place to another through the desert. I would carry a 5 pound gun in my hand, the communication equipment on my back, as well as a tarp, used both as a tent and a bed. And on top of that food and water. It was not like that we would be able to hand over some of our food to someone we meet along the road. These were harsh conditions. At the stations there was food and water. If people came to the bases and were denied food and water there, it's another story."
My thought about the Wagalla massacre: units within the security forces are influenced by the harsh circumstances they have to work in. Within six months of service in North Eastern quite a share of them go mentally insane. Then these partly sane forces are given power over then powerless people, whom the security forces blame for many of the problems they had faced until then. The combination of the antecedents and this sudden power disparity has proven to be lethal.
[The writer does not insist that every statement and notion given in this text is based on the truth]
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