Nairobi has been rocked by a terror related incident where a huge blast followed by a gun battle rocked an upmarket hotel and office complex in Nairobi on Tuesday leaving 14 dead.
The Somalia-based militant group Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack on the Dusit office and hotel complex on 14 Riverside Drive in Nairobi’s Westlands suburb on Tuesday.
Shabaab has now been at this longer than most of its adversaries and, in recent years, shown that it has a long game.
The Riverside Drive attack repeats a pattern seen in 2011.
In a series of cross-border raids, Shabaab gunmen kidnapped aid workers at the Dadaab refugee camp in Garissa and tourists in Lamu.
The media was flooded with reporting and commentary about then-President Mwai Kibaki government’s inability to protect the country and confront terrorism threats.
However , when Garrisa university was attacked leaving 148 dead , Mr Duale sensationally promised to expose the financiers and sympathisers of Al-Shabaab in the country. It could be that the announcement, which also fingered Dadaab Refugee Camp as a place where terrorists hide and recruit, was made on the spur of the moment.
Jubilee members, led by then TNA chairman Johnson Sakaja, mounted pressure on Mr Duale to produce the list or step aside.
Mr Duale said he would not be bullied around on the war against terrorism, which he said he was helping the government fight.
Mr Duale said: “We are not playing politics. We are not answerable to anybody and we owe nobody any form of a list. As the leadership, we will work with the security agencies to make sure the region and Kenya is safe from Al-Shabaab.
One would have hoped that the supposed moral indignation and sense of shock displayed by Mr Duale and other functionaries at the brazen attack would be followed with action.
Years and months after the declaration to unmask the financiers was made, the public is still in the dark.
Having made his spur-of-the-moment declaration and perhaps realised the magnitude of his gaffe, Mr Duale noticeably took a very low profile and hoped the matter would blow over.
He even went ahead in a defiant fashion,and told off the late Major-General (rtd) Joseph Nkaissery, saying he was not answerable to him, remarks that could only escalate the bad situation.
The implication of his statement was that he knew the financiers. That means a lot.
His contention that leaders from North Eastern had played their part in the war on terror by making recommendations to President Uhuru Kenyatta on how to win it is, at best, simplistic.
In the same month, there were reports that terrorists had murdered a chief in Mandera after failing to get a Sh4 million ransom they had demanded.
Early that month, 20 Al-Shabaab gunmen attacked a police camp at Hamey in Garissa County and killed one police officer.
Silence is always golden, it may yet prove otherwise for Mr Duale. Because he risks being seen as harbouring those who have caused Kenyans great harm and anguish.
At the very least, he could just come out and accept that he had erred in promising to release the list. Kenya is tired of terror attacks and such political statements that are made should not go without answers.
Duale should not get away with this