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Explosion In Nairobi : Follow-up

Posted June 11th, 2007 in News by M

The police has released a statement with regards to the explosion that took place earlier.

This morning at about 08:15 hrs, a small explosion occurred outside the City Gate Restaurant situation along Moi Avenue outside the city centre. One person was killed and over 30 others were injured. Doctors have confirmed that none of the injuries is life threatening.

Presently, police investigators are pursuing promising leads to ascertain the identity of the perpetrators and possible motives(s) that led to this incident. To begin with, a post mortem is conducted to assist in investigations over the precise cause of death and samples will be sent for further investigations both in local and foreign laboratories.

Additionally, explosives experts and other forensics detectives are going on with investigations. So far, debris from the scene is being examined for traces of explosives. Police are recording statements from persons who were at the scene.

Initial investigations show that the source of the explosion was extremely small. At the scene, only glass windows within a two metre radius were shattered, and injuries sustained are relatively minor. A public service commuter bus which was at the scene had its windscreen shattered and has been driven off to the police yard for further investigations. No traces of combustion or high explosives were detected at the scene.

We understand and appreciate the need to solve such cases expeditiously to allay public concerns that quite often are fanned by rumours or distorted information. It is, however, prudent to be realistic and recognise that all investigations take time. As I told you in my two other press briefings earlier today, we shall periodically provide briefings and updates without jeopardising the conduct of investigations.

I wish to thank all the emergency services for their prompt action, and particularly thank Kenyatta National Hospital, St. John’s Ambulance and others. In a nutshell, our disaster management procedures worked well. Most importantly we are appealing to any person with any information on this incident to contact the police as soon as possible.

Read it in its original form from the Office Of The Government Spokesman site.

Today has just illustrated the double edged nature of pervasive communication like blogs, email and text messaging. There is no doubt that these platforms are powerful tools for communicating information. There is also no doubt that they are powerful tools for spreading disinformation. The rumours and innuendo that have gotten to me have left me speechless. Some of the accounts have received indicate hundreds dead and the whole block leveled. Blame has been laid at the doors of Al Qaeda, clumsily detonated grenades, Mungiki, time bombs, electronically detonated bombs and mobile phone detonated bombs.

Mail servers have been forwarding all these conflicting accounts all day. Many bloggers have wasted no time posting some of these theorems as fact. Safaricom ad Celtel have made a killing today relaying text messages.

What we don’t seem to realize is that:

  1. The cause of the explosion is yet to be confirmed by those in the know. These happen to be the police. Not the papers. Not the Internet. Not the FM Stations. The police. Regardless of your opinion of them, of all the authorities to listen to, they should be the first.
  2. Forwarding these rumours of suicide bombers has unnecessarily caused many people to panic
  3. If it turns out the explosion was a mere gas cylinder, the damage will already have been done. Once you put something on the Internet, there it stays. For instance, do a search for suicide bombers Kenya or suicide bomber Nairobi and see what turns up. Since it is already apparent that sensationalism generally wins over facts, our reputation will have been needlessly sullied
  4. Blogs, email and text messages, while lending themselves to informing, also lend themselves to abuse.

Until I hear official facts to the contrary, I will hold the opinion that if you emailed, texted or blogged about the explosion crediting it as a suicide bomber/Mungiki/Al Qaeda or any other explanation that has yet to be confirmed, you did yourself, your loved ones and your country a disservice. 

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  • http://3nspeaks.blogspot.com 3n

    I have to admit a did a disservice to some friends when I linked to the BBC report citing that this could be terrorist related.

    thanks M for pointing out the facts and warning against ill based conclusions.

  • http://kadhat.blogspot.com egm

    Thank you once more for stating this. My commute into work might have been less worrying had I not received that suicide bomber sms from a friend back home.

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  • I

    M.. thank you very much.. definatly appreciate you keeping the usual suspects that read your blog on the happenings of in Nai..

    and .. whomever wrote that speech for the police commissioner did a very good job as well. precise and to the point..

    Wow.. as for everyone else whose making things up as they go.. well.. there are those.. we just have to learn to live with them and not believe everything you hear or your told until you have done some research for your self..

  • http://mountkirima.blogspot.com Kirima

    Thanks M for the word of caution.
    At such moments of high anxiety telling people to wait for official statements from the police might not be an easy sell but it is better than spreading facts you are not sure of.
    Is there any hope of a reliable and frequently updated local news source, it amazed me how Nationmedia website was unavailable during this crisis. Does any of the local news media provide RSS news feeds?

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  • http://www.whiteafrican.com hash

    Just a thought, but most people give a good amount of credit to professional news reporters who write/talk about news as it happens. Bloggers do the same, and in cases like this, often have the same sources.

    “Professional news reporters” is an interesting term to apply to the Kenyan media, which has itself confessed that its rank and file is populated with many people that are not journalists. Having “The Standard” or “The Daily Nation” embossed on a lapel badge does not automatically make you an authority, or absolve you from the responsibility of due diligence. Papers have been known to be wrong. Pick any paper and within the first ten pages you can be assured you will find an ‘apology’ or a ‘clarification’.

    Mixing up captions has no lasting damage. Telling people for a fact that there are suicide bombers on these shores and it may not be the case has lasting damage

    Here’s an interesting thought, don’t so many of us concur that the “government” spokespeople are spinning and relaying false information for their own purposes all the time? Maybe not everyone… but I tend to disregard “official” statements on what happened quite a bit. Most of that is spin, let’s be honest.

    Hash, you’re preaching to the choir. From my past posts I believe you can gather that no one holds the government in a finer disdain than myself. However, I (grudgingly) concede that there are times when we must question why we question.

    Keep in mind that they have not given a cause of the explosion, ergo the issue of spin does not arise. I think it is perfectly in order for the police to ask for time to do their investigations. What benefit is there concluding it is a suicide bomber prematurely? What if it turns out the cause was a soldier who had a defective grenade on his person? The damage would have already been done. We would be living our lives akin to our friends in Israel who live constantly under the threat of suicide bombers and for what? Premature hearsay?

    Secondly, what possible benefit could accrue to denying that it was a suicide bomber if it was not? If they deny it and it is a fact, Kenyans would continue blissfully unaware of the looming threat and many more could be killed from subsequent attacks. Then what would the population think of the government?

  • http://blog.uhuru.de JKE

    I’d believe a tarot card reader than any Kenya government official.

    Like an SMS from a “reliable primary source”? Some choice!

    Kenya is going down the toilet while its citizens have their heads stuck in the cistern.

    The US embassy bombers also tried to flee the scene so anyone trying to spin this is either a terrorist sympathiser or has his head up Ali’s arse.

  • http://www.ciikuandhermess.blogspot.com Ciiku

    After reading the initial story on “breaking news” [E A Standard], I jogged to your site and directed people there!

  • http://alexcia.blogspot.com/ alexcia

    This is interesting pontification

    When the fire alarm goes off, Should you shout fire or wait for the fireman to come and verify a fire or a false alarm? After the fireman has arrived, what would be the point in your shouting?

    You miss my point entirely. Shout fire all you want. It is your duty to do so. What I object to you doing is shouting “arson” or “incendiary bomb”

    I mean think about it, if you have the “police report”, then what is left to blog about?

    :)) Say it ain’t so! Is your motivation “having something to blog about”

    THIS IS BREAKING NEWS.
    If you wait for the stories to be confirmed, then you might as well read it in the papers, NOT in emails or text messages.

    There is a word in the dictionary that defines relaying information from A to B without checking its accuracy. This word is gossip

    What is OK: Texting/sms/emailing your family, friends, etc that an explosion took place

    What I take issue with: Texting/sms/emailing your family, friends that a suicide bomber has struck. Says who? You? Something you read on the Internet?

    The objections I have seen that object to what I have said somehow intepret my words as saying we should not have blogged about what happened. Preposterous. I believe what I have said is very clear … inform. Don’t masquerade speculation as information

    Telling bloggers what they can or cannot write is censorship.
    The internet “blogsphere” is full of crap (and gems) even when we don’t have a tragic event in the country.

    Most users have learnt to navigate this maze and search and filter to the useful information.

    My friend, in your haste to comment, you apparently failed to read my post to the end. I believe I was very very clear in what I said. Kindly scroll up and read this bit

    if you emailed, texted or blogged about the explosion crediting it as a suicide bomber/Mungiki/Al Qaeda or any other explanation that has yet to be confirmed, you did yourself, your loved ones and your country a disservice.

    Really, I don’t see any need to comment further. That statement in no way says that you should not blog/talk/sms about it. As for the censorship angle you threw in there .. what can I say? I am not about to apologize for asking people to refrain from needlessly spreading panic and hearsay. It is your prerogative if you wish to write anything you hear/imagine/feel on the Internet, regardless of its degree of fact. But my friend being a blogger does not absolve you of the tenets of responsibility.

  • jogoo wa shamba

    speculation particularly on tragedies like this one does lots of disservice to our country. The shilling has already lost some ground to the dollar and there is no telling who is going to issue another travel advisory.

  • jogoo wa shamba

    speculation on tragedies like this one do lots of disservice to our country.The shilling has already lost ground to the dollar and there is no telling who is going to issue another travel advisory.

  • http://Seasonsandreasons.blogspot.com Seasons and Reasons

    I received the photos in an email forward that suggested the suicide bomber angle. Initially, I was tempted to post the story on my blog but decided to check Kenyan blogs that brought me here.

    I think your posting caution is a great thing

    I for one hope that it turns out to be anything other than a suicide bomber …
  • Dshy

    My only contention is with the media who tend to report along the lines of ‘wind them up-watch them go i.e. they will spout whatever happens to be the current government line, the same government which in times of crisis, tends to put the best face on things, even if that face distorts reality. So you can see the obvious pitfall in relying on the latter as a reliable source of information.

    Other than that, I fully agree with you, it was reckless of people to postulate opinions as facts. Regarding doing ourselves a great disservice, I am of the humble opinion that panicking is human nature, no matter how plausible or utterly insane the reason, its just how our society works. With time, maybe we will see the folly of our knee jerk reaction, but I will still maintain that while it may have come across as inexcusable, it was still understandable. Unacceptable, but given the circumstances and past events (previous bombing) justifiable.

    Your thoughts?

    Understandable? I’m not too sure about that. Of all things to assume why a suicide bomber? I don’t think we can even begin to comprehend life under the cloud of a suicide bomber. No amount of CNN can quite paint the picture of a life where the man next to you in the bus looking around may be planning to kill you. Life looking at every laptop bag, satchel, attache case and brief case with suspicion. Life where you are uneasy to be in a crowd. I don’t think we have the slightest comprehension of what it is like to live in Israel or Iraq for instance
  • Ms K

    “Professional news reporters” is an interesting term to apply to the Kenyan media, which has itself confessed that its rank and file is populated with many people that are not journalists. Having “The Standard” or “The Daily Nation” embossed on a lapel badge does not automatically make you an authority, or absolve you from the responsibility of due diligence. Papers have been known to be wrong. Pick any paper and within the first ten pages you can be assured you will find an ‘apology’ or a ‘clarification’.”

    We risk throwing out the baby etc etc. Yes there are lots of incompetent reporters but there are just a many good ones.

    Reading it again, that didn’t sound the way I intended. What I wanted to say is that the fact that it was reported by a journalist does not mean that journalists are in any position to conclude that it was a suicide bomber and go ahead to press. Mistakes can and have been made. Especialy when the people writing the stories are not actually trained journalsits

    I think the most important point you make (for me!) is about “responsibility of due diligence”. You’re right, we are all human, we make mistakes. If we are all that much more careful, the mistakes will definitely become less. But we are all each others eyes. When we see the mistakes, we should correct each other, and those corrected must take time to correct their mistake.

    But we must also be careful not to castigate those who make mistakes too harshly. We are all learning my friend, we are all learning.

    Granted, and I agree totally with you. What I was trying to say is that as much as possible we should try and avoid mistakes in the first place. Some mistakes are not so easy to undo

    And on that note, I am sending a petition to the people. Printing that photo of a blast victim on todays (12 June) paper was the height of bad taste, orresponsibility and downright stupidity.

    Good Lord! Washindwe pepo!!! That paper precisely makes my point. If you took such a paper to ocha and the people there read the horrifying sensationalism … If it turned out it was a gas explosion after all, how easy would it be to convince people that Nairobi is not Tel Aviv after all?
  • Ms K

    I meant the People newspaper.

    Oh, and I was going to say, you don’t find corrections/clarifications every day bana! But they do make a very strong case for your due diligence point. When we are wrong, we must admit we are wrong.

    Touche my dear touche! :D {swallowing own words}
  • http://kadhat.blogspot.com egm

    Quoting from Spiderman, “With great power comes great responsibility”. The power of the blog medium to give a voice to the person on the street to report and comment on things should be accompanied by the responsibility of due dilligence. There is freedom to write anything and everything. That, however, does not necessarily mean that anything and everything being written will result in the improvement of the reader.

  • Dshy

    Hi M,

    In answer to your question about not being able to comprehend what it is like to live in Israel or Iraq, you are right, I don’t, but then again that’s a very extreme case. Closer to home, I was in London when the July bomb went off, so I can categorically state that I know what it means to start reciting last prayers at the sight of a lone item in the underground tube station. In addition, I travel to London a lot, sometimes out of choice (shopping etc) and sometimes for work. I use all the major underground connections (The choice target of terrorists, because of the capacity to inflict damage on a very large scale in one go. About 150,000 passengers travel through the underground in a day), so I have an idea of it means to live in fear and uncertainty.

    To fully appreciate the current attitude of Londoners sitting next to a potential suicide bomber, let me tell you a short story. My sister and her Muslim friend were waiting for a train. Said veiled friend was carrying a backpack. At one point, she got so paranoid from the suspicious and hostile looks being sent her way, she pleaded with my sister to stand closer so people would not think she was a suicide bomber, now given that my sister looks Somalian, you can see the fallacy in this logic, but logic plays in such a situation, which brings me to the point I was making in my previous comment about people reacting instinctively to a given situation, however irrational that reaction may be.

    We all have different ways of approaching a crisis, what is certain is that in this instance, we all share the same goal i.e. to get to the bottom of this, sure we might disagree on a few issues but what remains static is we are all Kenyans, ultimately, it affects all of us equally. Therefore, what I am asking for is a bit of tolerance, rather than little patience.

    Ps – M, This is a polite discussion and nothing more, (God knows my malovings for you is only surpassed by my wendo for blackforest cake from Java) I am fortunate to know that you are stand up guy, whose motives I have never had to question, thus the (disjointed) effort to try and persuade you to view this through a different lens.

    :D My dear, no one enjoys a spirited discussion more than me. I appreciate all you’re saying. In fact you’re even helping me make my point. In a crisis such as what happened yesterday, the question arises: is creating an atmosphere of panic and uncertainty for others an acceptable way of dealing with the situation?
  • http://tallb.wordpress.com aegeus

    This was the first place i saw that this had happened. I was home sick so i was not aware that there had been an explosion earlier in the day. It is then that i tuned into the local stations and saw the reports “live”. Thanks M for educating blogren, some were so alarmist that i would not have ventured into town later in the day! It is a really powerful medium and before they publish hearsay at least have the due diligence to verify them as fact beforehand.

  • Ni2

    Have you ever played “broken Telephone?”

  • Ni2

    Oh yeah and another thing.

    As I did not get any such sms or email about explosions would that mean? :-)

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