A Uganda People's Defense Forces (UPDF) soldier shot himself dead in Bunyangabu district on Friday.

Private Godfrey Nandasaba reportedly took his own life from inside his army tent at Kisogi-Rwimi army detach in Kabonero sub county. 

According to the UPDF Mountain Division spokesperson, Capt George Musinguzi, the incident happened at around 6 pm under circumstances that are yet to be established. He explains that his colleagues suddenly heard bullets from his tent and when they rushed there, they found that he had shot himself in the head and was already dead. 

Musunguzi says they are now investigating circumstances under which Nandasaba cut his life short, adding that they already have leads it could have been as a result of a family misunderstanding. 

In November last year, a Court Martial sitting at Muhooti barracks in Fort Portal Tourism city handed a UPDF soldier a 90-year sentence for murder.

Private Paul Lotukei was found guilty of murdering Pamela Nayebale, 26, and her nine-month-old son, Owen Kusemererwa, both residents of Kitumba village in Nyakigumba Sub County, Bunyangabu district. - URN/The Observer

Muslim women and children in Lamu in north east Kenya. Al-Shabaab’s recruitment of female members is most evident in coastal and north eastern counties. Photo by Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images/Photo Courtesy

The direct involvement of women and girls in terrorism has attracted increased interest as the nature of recruitment tactics has evolved. In Kenya, their involvement in terrorist networks, such as the Al-Shabaab, is an emerging trend. The recruitment of female members is most evident in Kenya’s coastal and North Eastern counties but has also been reported in many other counties.

Women and girls have been identified as recruiters for the terrorist group, logistics planners, financial conduits, spies for terrorist activities and in some cases, masterminds behind terrorist attacks or conveners of terror cells.

The Al-Shabaab, or “the youth”, emerged in the mid-2000s as an offshoot of a Jihadist movement that peaked during Somalia’s civil war in the 1990s. Driven out of Mogadishu in 2006, it continues to pursue its main aim of establishing an Islamic state in Somalia through violent means. It has carried out repeated deadly attacks in Somalia but also in Kenya and Uganda. Both contribute troops to the African Union force in Somalia.

In one of my previous studies, I found that women may participate willingly because the extremist ideology resonates with their religiously inclined cultural values. They may also join due to the financial benefits that come with belonging to or associating with the group. Also, women may be forced or coerced to join through deception or intimidation.

In my most recent study I looked at different ways in which recruitment occurs to analyse the diverse motivations of women and girls to join Al-Shabaab in the coastal region of Kenya. In particular, I sought to establish the “voluntariness” of their decisions – in other words, did they sign up on their own volition?

I interviewed 36 women or girls who had returned home from terrorist camps or defected from the network. I generated 16 case accounts of women and girls who explained ‘voluntariness’ in Al-Shabaab recruitment.

The study revealed that the gender-dynamics of submission and subordination within families and the community contributes to Al-Shabaab recruitment. However, there were political and ideological motivations too.

Volunteering to the Al-Shabaab

But what do we mean by voluntary?

Recruitment was deemed to be voluntary if a woman or girl – without duress – elected to join the Al-Shabaab network. Recruitment was viewed as involuntary if it occurred through deceptive or coercive means.

However, I must caution that voluntary and involuntary are not always mutually exclusive. I found that depending on allegiances, social interactions, ideological resonance, and changing circumstances within and beyond the Al-Shabaab network, recruits may reverse their original views.

Furthermore, there is need to examine different aspects of autonomous decision-making. Some women who join terrorist networks do so to assert themselves within systems of oppression and patriarchy, and to embrace the lure of emancipation within the utopian caliphate.

In my study four main circumstances emerged as the reasons behind decisions to join Al-Shabaab.

Defending the faith

Al-Shabaab thrives on the narrative of Kenya as a Christian state oppressing Muslims in Somalia and Kenya. This resonates with the global marginalisation of Muslims. Political and religious motivations came up during our interviews, as well as the expressed desire to support or defend fellow Muslims.

Two women explained their motivations to be wives of martyrs and to play their role to support the Muslim Ummah, or community. Nine interviewees explained how ideology influenced their decisions to support the Al-Shabaab cause. These decisions belie Kenyan media accounts of naive girls manipulated through romantic notions of Jihadi brides or wives.

Aisha, 25 at the time, an Al-Shabaab returnee who defected after two years said:

I read a lot of materials. I was sad at how Muslims were treated as a second class group. I didn’t want my people to suffer, I needed to do something. I wanted to assist them in Somalia.

Reacting to a personal crisis

Al-Shabaab recruitment thrives on revenge among individuals who see the state as the perpetrator of the injustices suffered in their lives. A crisis event in the life of women and girls – such as the police killing a loved one – was found to be an important tipping point. Some women join extremist networks to avenge the death of a husband, fiancé, or son at the hands of government security actors.

There’s also evidence of recruiters penetrating existing networks of aggrieved women, including relatives of fallen Al-Shabaab members. Peer influence is used to influence or coerce women to follow the relative’s cause.

Close interpersonal relations

Daily interactions with family, friends and peers also shaped the decision to join the network in 9 out of the 16 case studies. A woman’s autonomy in marital relationships may be constrained in ways that push her to follow her husband or other influential male relatives’ lead.

The decision to join is autonomous if it is her choice. Nevertheless, her choice may be coerced within marital and family relationships. This occurs when a woman exhibits excessive deference to the wishes of her family members.

Ideology rubbing off in camps

Some women may have been recruited involuntarily. However, after a prolonged period of time in the terrorist camp or association with terrorist fighters, three of the 16 identified for this study accepted the ideology and subsequently volunteered to join Al-Shabaab.

Mary, a Muslim convert, was recruited by a friend in the guise of a job in Somalia. She was 18 years old when she was recruited in 2015. In camp she was subjected to work and religious indoctrination.

After a few days, I was worn out. I was also learning the religion…I kind of started to accept it. I felt it was right to fight for our [Muslim] freedom. It was like a moral obligation. I wanted to be a part of the Al-Shabaab network.

Conclusion

An examination of the political and ideological motivations behind women joining the Al-Shabaab shows that in some cases, they do make autonomous decisions based on their response to the grievances of the Muslim community.

But other structural and cultural factors were at play such as the patriarchal set-up in families and their communities. Some women’s decision making conformed to subservient attitudes and roles. These women, mainly from the coastal Muslim communities, revealed that they were subject to traditional gender roles, suggesting deference to social norms.

But not all women joining the Al-Shabaab lived lives of subjugation prior joining. Some returnees had good family lives or were happily settled. By Fathima Azmiya Badurdeen, The Conversation

Highlighting a continuing lack of local and national infrastructure almost a year since the formation of the Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity in South Sudan, Yasmin Sooka, Chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights in the country noted that although the signing of the Revitalized Peace Agreement two years ago had “led to a reduction in hostilities at the national level”, the country seen “a massive escalation in violence” locally. 

Power vacuum filled by fighting 

Echoing that finding, Commission member Barney Afako explained that signing the cessation of hostilities ceasefire had left “a vacuum” at the community level. 

“There are no governors in place or no county commissioners in place. So, there is nobody to deal with those cleavages which had remained. Instead what we saw, was that the weaponry that have been left in the community as well as that which is now supplied by others fuelled this communal violence”, he said. 

Other worrying developments include restrictions and self-censorship among journalists and pressure groups. 

New level of fear 

“The level of State suppression and inability of civil society or journalists to operate is now completely different”, said Commission member Andrew Clapham. “There is sort of levels of fear and the State suppression and the fact that you can be picked up and tortured and killed is rather different”. 

In its latest report, the Commission describes “waves of attacks and reprisals” that have left hundreds of South Sudanese women, men and children dead, maimed or destitute in Jonglei State and the Greater Pibor Administrative Area. 

Ms. Sooka told journalists via video conference that the armed groups and militias had mobilized along ethnic lines, often with the support of armed State and opposition forces.  

She highlighted clashes last year between allied Dinka and Nuer militias and Murle pastoralist militias with massive violations against civilians, including killing and displacement. 

“We have documented the new levels of militia violence engulfing more than three-quarters of the country at a localized level in which children carry weapons and women are traded as spoils of war like chattels”, Ms. Sooka said. 

‘Children all have guns’ 

The Commission Chairperson said that civilians described combatants using weapons that they had never seen before.  

“One man told the Commission, ‘I went to Pibor town and I saw guns being sold there. There the black guns used by the NSS were being sold for 25,000 South Sudanese shillings, each less than a few hundred dollars.’ He also said that children all have guns”, she recounted. 

Ms. Sooka also described as “shocking” the high number of fighters involved in localized conflicts and highlighted that women were traded as “spoils of war”. 

Moreover, children carry weapons and the levels of violence “have already surpassed” those documented in December 2013, when civil war erupted. 

Forced to fight, identities erased 

Describing attacks in Jonglei and the Greater Pibor area, she pointed to “systemically and deliberately torched” homes, murders, forced displacements, abductions, rapes, sexual enslavement and, in some instances, forced marriages to captors. Abducted boys have been forced to fight and, sometimes “forcibly assimilated into rival armed groups”. 

These victims have had their ethnic and other identities “completely erased”, according to the Commission’s report, which noted that as of December 2020, hundreds of abductees were still missing, with hundreds of thousands displaced by the violence and recurrent flooding. 

The Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan is due to present its report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on 10 March. - United Nations