Kenya programme funds dozens of mentors to work with 200 vulnerable people in bid to stamp out extremism

It’s morning in Majengo, a poor neighbourhood of Mombasa. The palm trees and swimming pools of the tourist resorts scattered around the coastal Kenyan city seem a world away from these narrow, rubbish-strewn streets and tin-roofed homes. In a small community centre, a small group sit on the battered wooden benches in the searing summer heat talking of extremism, police violence and gangs – and hope and courage.

Majengo already had a bad reputation before Islamist militants killed 21 in an assault in January on a luxury hotel, office and restaurant complex in the capital Nairobi, 500km away. The neighbourhood has long been known as a fertile recruiting ground for al-Shabaab, the Islamist extremist organisation based in neighbouring Somalia that is responsible for a bloody if intermittent terrorist campaign in Kenya.

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The suicide bomber who led the assault in Nairobi has been identified as Mahir Khalid Riziki, 25, from Majengo. Investigators are still trying to understand exactly howhe was recruited, trained and then returned to Kenya by al-Shabaab, an affiliate of al-Qaida.

In Majengo, locals have a good idea how it might have happened. Rukiya, 27, describes how he came close to being recruited. With a group of friends, he attended local extremist mosques that were later shut down by authorities.

“We felt [going to fight with al-Shabaab] was a religious duty. We were looking forward to being martyrs,” he said.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Security forces help civilians flee the scene as cars burn at a hotel complex in Nairobi, Kenya, in January. Photograph: Ben Curtis/AP

“My mother did not want me to fight but my father was supportive. Many people I know went to Somalia, but I was lucky. I ended up in a religious school where a different teacher made me realise that my ideas about holy war were all wrong.”

Rukiya is now part of an innovative £2.5m programme run by Royal United Services Institute (Rusi) , a thinktank in London. Most efforts to tackle extremism aim to “de-radicalise” existing militants but these have had only patchy success since they were first pioneered a decade or so ago.

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The Rusi programme is different. It has its origins in crime prevention and focuses instead on stopping people becoming drawn into extremism. Since 2016, it has funded dozens of mentors in Kenya who work with more than 200 people seen as vulnerable to recruitment efforts and dangerous ideologies. Thirty-two individuals have “graduated” from the programme.

Along with extremism, Majengo also suffers from soaring levels of unemployment, drugs and gangs.

Martine Zeuthen, the team leader, said a wide network of social workers, local clerics and teachers referred those thought to be at risk.

There are several indicators: a close friend or relative who had joined al-Shabaab, actively advocating violent extremism in the community, membership of a gang or a recent incarceration. Coming from an abusive family, dropping out of school or converting to Islam were also risk factors, Zeuthen said, though of less relevance.

The programme links the vulnerable with a mentor, often someone from the same neighbourhood who has overcome similar challenges, who can help them deal with any serious problems in their lives, support them emotionally and divert them from the “alternative community” offered by extremist groups.

Zeuthen said the programme was prompting “a lot of interest in the US and Europe” and an approach of looking at terrorism as “just another serious crime”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Young people gather after Friday prayers in Majengo. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Kenya has long suffered from extremism. A first wave of violence between 1998 and 2002 was directed by al-Qaida against foreign targets, including US embassies and Israeli tourists. It had ebbed by the middle of the last decade.

But radicalism continued to grow among Kenya’s Muslim minority, fuelled by a sense of marginalisation, the impact of the US-led “war on terror” and a shift away from traditional moderate Islamic practices to more rigorous versions of the faith promoted by countries in the Gulf.

“First we starting seeing signs of religious intolerance, and young men were disappearing. It was related to the world picture and the perception that the US and the western world were enemies of Islam, and in Kenya Muslims were feeling that they were second class citizens. We also started feeling the influence of the Gulf states which brought different views about non-believers,” said Sheik Yusuf Abu Hamza, a cleric in the sprawling and very poor Nairobi neighbourhood of Kibera.

In 2013 gunmen from al-Shabaab stormed a shopping mall in Nairobi, killing 67 people. Then 148 people were shot dead at a university in Kenya’s north-east. Both attacks were launched from Somalia, where Kenyan troops are fighting the extremists as part of an African Union force, but drew attention to support networks within Kenya itself.

Almost all the mentors – who are paid a small stipend by Rusi – and the mentees interviewed by the Guardian in Majengo complained of police harassment and brutality.

“It is like a reflex action. Even if there is just a small incident, the patrols come through. After [the recent] Nairobi attack, most of us ended up being arrested, detained, questioned,” said Nolly, 35. Others allege bribes and mistreatment.

Recruiters specifically target women, said Fatima, 27, who admitted to having once been “very close to getting involved” in extremism.

“I was going to fight for Muslims. I wanted my revenge on people who judged me because I was a Muslim. I was crazy,” she said. “The youth just have unemployment, poverty. We don’t have an opportunity to express ourselves. There is a sense the government is targeting a certain community.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Muslim men at a roadside cafe in Majengo. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Local senior police officials say they make strenuous efforts to “win hearts and minds”.

Recently, Kenyan authorities have faced a new wave of Islamist militants who are better educated, from a wider range of ethnic backgrounds and include more women.

All those involved in January’s attack appear to have been born in Kenya, and one is the son of an army NCO from Kenya’s largest ethnic community, the Kikuyu.

“As long as this kind of wrong religion is there, then radicalisation will not end… There are new teachers and new recruits among young people,” said Rukiya. He and others in the programme told the Guardian they know young people who have gone to Somalia recently.

But many are optimistic.

“There is a growing sense of belonging [in the Muslim community],” said Abu Hamza, the cleric. “This generation feel Kenyan and what to do something for the country.”

In Majengo, Fatima, 25, said the mentor programme had taught her to believe in herself, to value the life she has and that revenge is not the answer.

“I used to feel there was only me to face so many problems. I used to fear people but now I have courage”,” she said.

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