Roundup: Kenyan teachers urged to return to work amid anxiety

The Kenyan government on Wednesday appealed to teachers working in northern region to resume duties as it fixes security which had deteriorated late last year.

More than 2,000 teachers from Wajir, Mandera and Garissa counties which had experienced increased terror attacks from Somali militants last year are demanding transfers from the clash- hit region.

The teachers have cited insecurity as their main concern, adding that the region was unfit for them and their families amid increased hostility from Muslim residents.

Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaiserry told journalists in Nairobi that the government has stepped up security measures in the affected areas and that all public transport vehicles to the three counties will be given armed escort.

"I want to request the teachers just to be brave enough like all the citizens in Mandera, and go back and perform their duties because there is security and we shall provide security for them," he said.

Nkaiserry said the government was working on a strategy on how to secure the East African nation which has suffered several terror attacks and not just Mandera.

"I have put a detailed strategy in place which you don't expect me to tell you, but we are going to ensure every citizen is secure, " he said.

The teachers who have been camping at the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) headquarters in Nairobi vowed not to return to northern Kenya, citing insecurity and hostility towards them by the local communities.

The teachers are demanding the government to solve insecurity in the region to deter any instances where they are being targeted by local communities as revenge whenever security operations are carried out in the region.

The teachers also pointed out incidences where some teachers have been threatened with death in a bid to allow students cheat in national exams.

They further stressed their risk noting that some of the students are armed with firearms.

The teachers' agony follows two attacks by militants in the November 2014 over a Nairobi-bound bus, in which they brutally killed 28 non-Muslims and the massacre of 36 quarry workers in Mandera.

Some trade unions, including those of teachers and medical workers, were then advised to leave the area. Those at the base are in fact mainly teachers, health workers, construction workers and other civil servants.

However, the government said besides improving the key roads in Mandera, the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) and the police were to provide escort for travelers along the dangerous borderline route on which 28 people were killed.

The teachers' employer TSC has also assured teachers that the government has increased security in the region to avert any attacks. The teachers however rejected the commission's directive to report to their work stations.

One of the teachers who survived one of the attacks narrated how they were travelling in a bus when they were attacked and ordered to stop but fortunately the driver did not comply after which they used a grenade to stop the bus.

At least 17 teachers were killed in November last year by Al- Shabaab terrorists while they were travelling in a bus from Mandera to Nairobi.

Several civilians including policemen have also been killed especially in the northern counties of Garissa, Wajir and Mandera which are near the border with Somalia since Kenya launched cross border incursion in southern Somalia in 2011.

Subsequent efforts to fight terrorism and neutralise Al-Shabaab threats have seen anti-terrorism police unit arrest dozens of other Kenyans on suspicion of being members of the Somali terror group.

It is such suspects, and dozens others, born and bred in Kenya and who are believed to be sympathisers of Al-Shabaab that the East African nation is grappling with in its fight against terror. Endi