After prominent radical cleric Abubakar Shariff, also known as Makaburi, was shot dead outside Shanzu Law Courts in Mombasa by unknown attackers, angry Kenyan youths took to the streets of the Kenyan city to protest against what they termed as extrajudicial killing. The killing sparked demonstrations in Mombasa's poorer area of Majengo, and on violent protests with police. Mombasa police, which had been deployed at large numbers used tear gas and fired in the air to disperse the crowd. Too much hate towards the police was at display after the last Friday prayers in March. Two other Muslim clerics have been killed in Kenya in the last two years, all in the same way. Sheikh Aboud Rogo, a mentor to Makaburi, was killed in 2012 and radical cleric Sheikh Ibrahim Omar was gunned in 2013. But many Kenyans have praised the murder of Makaburi. "The majority of the population are happy as Makaburi, for them is a symbol of terrorism," Abdullahi Boru, Horn of Africa analyst, told The Islamist Gate. "The other part is partly Muslim and partly human rights defenders." Makaburi was a firm believer of Shari'ah law and supporter of the Islamist militant group al-Shabaab. He was outspoken and controversial with a large number of followers. During a recent speech, President Uhuru Kenyatta said that the terrorist attacks, blamed on Somali-based Islamist militants, try to provoke a sectarian conflict but will fail. "The terrorists would be handled ruthlessly, decisively and lawfully," he noted. Kenyatta also said that the country would not continue to host refugees at the expense of his people's peace, arguing that the country hosts one million refugees, many of who come from neighbouring Somalia. The refugee rhetoric is not new, "Nothing happens, it is simply the same old, unhelpful rhetoric," explained Boru. "Here, every Somali is a potential trouble-maker, they remain second-class citizens with the weight of the state on their shoulders." The event is an example of Kenya's troubled relation to the country's Somali community. "Since 1960s the Somalis have been branded as bandits and under counter-terrorism they are all rounded up as terrorists," said Boru. Since Al-Shabaab attacked a Westgate mall in September 2013 the security situation has been tense in the east African nation. The attack killed at least 67 people, and was justified by Makaburi as retribution for the Kenyan military's involvement in Somalia. After a number of border attacks, Kenyan troops put their boots on Somali soil in 2011 to fight Al-Shabaab. "As long as the Kenyans deny that what is going on in Kenya has no relations with our intervention in Somalia we will have problems," argued Boru, who is Kenyan himself. "Before our intervention in 2011 al-Shabaab didn't attack us, they attacked Western interests."
