
A peace and security lobby in the country is appealing to Kenyans to take the lead role in fighting violent extremism.
Champions of Peace Kenya, which has been traversing the country creating awareness on ways of taming violent extremism among communities says such softer approach, will positively impact the fight against violent extremism and terrorism in the country.
Speaking at a forum that involved Mombasa and Kilifi based journalists at the Provincial headquarters in Mombasa in abid to deliberate on various ways of involving the communities in the fight against violent extremism, Champions of Peace Executive Director, Elly Opondo noted that communities highly consume the news media content, further urging journalists to take responsibility and be accountable to the communities in enlightening them on the wrath of violent extremism and terrorism.
According to Mr Opondo, the media, religious and community leaders remain critical in the entire process of dissuading the youthful generation from violent extremism and terrorism.
The activist noted that the program funded by the Netherlands government and which is being implemented in 25 counties countrywide is focusing on the Coast region, North Eastern, Nairobi among other counties where the communities and mostly the youth remain vulnerable to terror networks.
Multi-agency approach
“For years as a country we have been focusing on the hard approach where our security agents take charge by applying excessive force, but we seriously thought about multi-agency and stakeholders soft approach in battling the security issue, indeed our efforts are yielding fruits,”revealed Mr Opondo during the session.
Champions of Peace conducted various deliberations and awareness sessions with communities in Tana River, Kilifi and Mombasa counties, where in the recent past, youth were recruited to joint militiamen in neighbouring country, Somalia.
“By directly involving these communities in taming the security but social vice, we will record milestones in safeguarding our young generation that remains vulnerable to violent extremism and terrorism.
The forum also involved the National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC), the local Administration led by Mombasa County Commissioner Abdirisak Jaldesa among other top Coast security officials.
CoP Kenya also conducted various forums with religious and community leaders in Tana River, Kilifi and Mombasa counties.
In Hola, Tana River county, the forum was led by Dutch Ambassador to Kenya Maarten Brouwer in efforts to deter communities from working with, or for terror networks among them the Al-shabab militia from Somalia.