Intelligence gathered by SIS shows that there is a growing list of Kenyans employed by Al-Shabaab terrorists to spy on targets.
Young men are using socio-media, telephones, and physical meetings to pass on information about possible targets in Kenya to terrorists, the report reads.
These young Kenyans earn some money from their surveillance activities for the terrorists.
This is treason for you cannot spy on your own country for its enemies. Treason is a big crime, lawyers explain.
The increase in Kenyan terrorist surveillance cells is factored by increased anti-terrorism programs by both intelligence services in the region and the AMISOM command.
Many terror plans have been thwarted through concerted efforts by these institutions.
Kenya itself has managed to foil deadly attacks on its cities, the magnitude of those attacks could have been worse than Westgate, argues a US security analyst.
What we are seeing is Al-Shabaab outsourcing intelligence collection from vulnerable and unpatriotic Kenyans.
These cells will be tracked and hunted down. They will be crushed and their masters taken out as well. It is a common but highly effective anti-terror strategy.
This new set-up will not survive, it will only have short-term results and intelligence services will bring down these cells, Strategic Intelligence analysis shows.
In Lamu, the targets of the terror attacks were picked based on their ethnic and religious backgrounds. The Mandera attacks bore the same marks.
The parading of the victims is borrowed from the Islamic States, while the cross border attacks are a borrowed leaf from Nigeria’s Boko-Haram. On the other hand, broadcasts and the justification of the attacks through citing of Islam and occupation by nonbelievers is used to maintain the A-Qaeda oath of allegiance.
However, Al-Shabaab cannot maintain all these faces; rather it is showing cracks in its mid-level leadership.
