Gunmen from the Islamist militant group al Shabaab stormed a university in Kenya and killed at least 147 people on Thursday, in the worst attack on Kenyan soil since the US embassy was bombed in 1998.
The siege ended nearly 15 hours after the Somali group’s gunmen shot their way into the Garissa University College campus in a pre-dawn attack, sparing Muslim students and taking many Christians hostage.
Meanwhile yesterday a government source said the death toll in the assault by Somali militants on a Kenyan university is likely to climb above 147 as anger grew among local residents over what they say was a government failure to prevent bloodshed.
Anger over massacre as there were warnings of an attack
Strapped with explosives, masked al Shabaab gunmen stormed the Garissa University College campus, some 200 kilometres from the Somali border, in a pre-dawn rampage on Thursday. Tossing grenades and spraying bullets at cowering students, the attackers initially killed indiscriminately. But they later freed some Muslims and instead targeted Christian students
Anger over the massacre was compounded by the fact there were warnings last week that an attack on a university was imminent.
Local residents accused the authorities of doing little to boost security in this little-developed region.
“It’s because of laxity by the government that these things are happening. For something like this to happen when there are those rumours is unacceptable,” said Mohamed Salat, 47, a Somali Kenyan businessman.
Officials said almost at least 79 were wounded, many critically. But with an uncertain number of students and staff still missing, the casualties may yet mount.
Kenya's biggest-selling Daily Nation newspaper, citing sources, yesterday said the death toll would be significantly higher.
Outside the university gates, a throng of veiled women clung to the hope that missing people would still turn up alive.
“We are here waiting for news if we can find him, dead or alive,” said Barey Bare, 36, referring to her cousin who worked as a clerk at the university and has been missing since Thursday.
The violence will heap further pressure on President Uhuru Kenyatta, who has struggled to stop frequent militant gun and grenade attacks that have dented Kenya’s image abroad and brought the country’s vital tourism industry to its knees.
More than 400 people have been killed by al-Qaeda-allied al Shabaab in the east African nation since Kenyatta took office in April 2013, including some 67 people who died in a blitz on a shopping mall in the capital Nairobi in September of that year.
Survivors of the Garissa attack yesterday spoke of merciless executions by the attackers, who stalked classrooms and dormitories hunting for non-Muslim students.
Reuben Mwavita, 21, a student, said he saw three female students kneeling in front of the gunmen, begging for mercy.
“The mistake they made was to say ‘Jesus, please save us’, because that is when they were immediately shot,” Mwavita said.
Many students fled into the sandy scrubland, scaling barbed-wire fences and jumping off buildings, often half-naked, as they were awoken by the sound of gunfire and explosions.