Mystery deepens over men linked to Mombasa explosion

By Joackim Bwana and Willis Oketch

Mombasa, Kenya: Police in Mombasa have released the criminal records of two people killed in Saturday’s bus stage explosion, as an MP threatened to resign over reports linking Suleiman Mohamed Said and Jamal Mohamed Awadh to the blast.

According to the records, Jamal had attended Islamic radicalisation sessions at the controversial Masjid Musa in Majengo, Mombasa. The mosque is being associated with slain radicals Sheikh Abubakar Sharif alias Makaburi and Sheikh Aboud Rogo Mohamed, both said to have had ties to Al Shabaab and its affiliate, Al Hijra.

Mvita MP Abdulswamad Sharif threatened to resign over claims by police that the two youths were members of Al Shabaab.

Mombasa CID boss Henry Ondiek unveiled Jamal and Suleiman’s criminal records and accused their relatives and human rights groups of trying to whitewash the deceased’s past.

Meanwhile, Mr Ondiek disclosed that detectives are holding two suspects of Somalia origin in relation to the weekend bomb attacks at Nyali Reef Hotel.

According to Ondiek, the two had checked into the hotel before the attack but it was not clear if they spent the night at the hotel, or what time they were arrested.

He said police received information from the hotel management about two suspicious people whom they thought were up to something sinister.

“The two suspects are said to have booked into the hotel and there are certain issues that point fingers at them and that they might have participated in the blast incident,” said the CID boss, referring to the Saturday evening blast on the beach behind Reef Hotel.

Regarding Jamal and Suleiman, police pressed ahead with a hypothesis that they do not have a clean record as portrayed by relatives and sympathetic rights activists.

The Haki Africa Rights group has spearheaded a campaign to suggest that police and the media are lying over the two, insisting that neither of them was arrested over the February 2 raid on the controversial Musa Mosque.

Group’s confusion

Police accuse Haki of mischief, pointing that the rights group is trying to introduce confusion in the debate. The group supplied a list of 104 suspects it says were arrested in the mosque on that day, which has neither Jamal nor Suleiman’s name.

It is not clear when this date was made because a police list supplied on February 3, included a Mr Mohamed Awadh as the 25th suspect. In Haki’s list, there is a similar name, Awadh, listed as the 24th witness.

Police say the said Mohamed Awadh is the Jamal killed in the blast and whom they arrested in the mosque. Haki has not indicated who this Mohamed Awadh is or denied this 24th or 25th witness is the deceased.

Meanwhile, Haki Africa’s list refers to the two killed on Saturday as Suleiman Mohamed and Jamal Mbarak, and police have challenged them to be categorical about whom they are defending.