For Many Africans, Bin Laden's Death was a Long Time Coming
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
Published: May 2, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/world/africa/03reax.html
NAIROBI, Kenya — For Douglas Sidialo, this was personal.
For the past 12 and a half years, Mr. Sidialo says he has been nursing
fantasies of skinning Osama bin Laden alive. He was an up-and-coming
Kenyan executive, on his way to work in August 1998, when Bin Laden's
men blew up the American Embassy in Nairobi, killing scores of people
and sending glass slicing through Mr. Sidialo's eyes, leaving him
totally blind.
But on Monday, when he turned on his radio at the crack of dawn as he
always does, Mr. Sidialo learned that Bin Laden was dead. "It was a
great relief," he said. "I only wish he had been captured, so he could
confess his sins and his evils."
Kenyans, from the president on down, seemed happy Bin Laden had been
killed.
"His killing is an act of justice," President Mwai Kibaki said.
Bin Laden's organization, Al Qaeda, has exploited this region's porous
borders and weak and often deeply corrupt security services, striking
several times. The attacks started in 1998, with the simultaneous
bombings of the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed
more than 200 people, most of them local workers. Al Qaeda struck
Kenya again in 2002, bombing a beachside hotel and nearly blowing up
an airliner full of Israeli tourists.
Then last summer, the Shabab, a Somali insurgent group that has
pledged allegiance to Bin Laden and adopted many signature Qaeda
tactics, claimed responsibility for sending a team of suicide bombers
to Uganda. They killed dozens of young Ugandans watching the World
Cup.
"The death of Bin Laden hopefully will bring about a new era," said
Kintu Nyango, an official in Uganda's president's office. "The world
will become a better place."
The Shabab said it had carried out the attack because Uganda had sent
thousands of peacekeepers to Somalia, to bolster the weak government
there and prevent Islamist insurgents from taking over the country.
Somali and American officials say several Qaeda agents have worked
closely with the Shabab and helped it build a core of foreign fighters
determined to turn Somalia into a battleground for jihad, leading to
American military strikes against them.
Somalia's president, Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, welcomed the death of
Bin Laden, accusing Al Qaeda of being behind suicide attacks that
killed Somali officials. Residents in Mogadishu echoed the sentiment,
hoping Bin Laden's death would weaken the Shabab.
"Our country has been destroyed by Osama's followers," said Hibaaq
Ali, a tea seller in Mogadishu, Somalia's capital. "Our youth were
misled" by his "murderous ethos," she added, "while many of our people
were dying for hunger and thirst. But, from today on, we will live in
peace, as the Shabab cannot stay without him. They will also
disappear."
Though feelings of joy, relief and comeuppance were widespread, they
were not unanimous. For some time in Nairobi, some minibuses have been
decorated with images of Bin Laden's face and "Osama" emblazoned on
the sides. Though Bin Laden's organization has killed many workaday
Kenyans, he seems to have been appreciated by some for his anti-
Western defiance, which connects to lingering anticolonial sentiments.
"I, personally, wasn't happy today," said Osman Sheikh, a scientist in
Nairobi. "When you kill someone, you can't hear his side of the story.
You don't live in a cave for years for nothing. Maybe there was a good
reason for doing what he did."
By Monday afternoon, a small crowd gathered in downtown Nairobi at the
memorial built on the site of the embassy that was blown up. Most were
friends or relatives of the victims. One woman quietly laid five roses
at the foot of a plaque commemorating the dead.
"I know this isn't the end of the war," she said. "But it's closure
for me."
In Sudan, where Bin Laden lived for several years in the 1990s, the
government declined to comment on Bin Laden's death. Many Sudanese
still sympathize with Al Qaeda, but the government is also eager to be
removed from the United States' list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Still, several Sudanese spoke openly on Monday about Bin Laden's
becoming a martyr.
Jamal Mahmud, a professor at Omdurman Islamic University, said he was
content that Bin Laden "died with American bullets" and not as a
prisoner. "We have been slaughtered by our enemies and he is the only
one who brought us a sense of victory," Mr. Mahmud said.
In Burkina Faso, a predominantly Muslim country in West Africa,
traders in the capital, Ouagadougou, mostly expressed satisfaction
over Bin Laden's demise. Christians and Muslims, side by side on the
Avenue de la Grande Mosquée, had similar reactions. Several said they
wished he had been captured alive so that he could have been
prosecuted to reveal the "truth," as some put it. Many expressed
skepticism over whether he was actually dead.
There were also fears of revenge.
"He's a gang leader," said Samuel Ilboudo, a trader. "There's a very
strong possibility his partners will react, and look for vengeance."
In an interview, the prime minister of Burkina Faso, Luc Adolphe Tiao,
congratulated the Americans and pointed out that his country was on
the front lines in the fight with Al Qaeda's North African affiliate.
"If it's true, then we cannot but salute this action," Mr. Tiao said.
He warned, though, that America must deal with the "causes" of
terrorism as well, or risk seeing a resurgence of Al Qaeda. "But I
think this is a good thing. It's a great victory for the Americans,"
Mr. Tiao said.
Reporting was contributed by Adam Nossiter from Ouagadougou, Burkina
Faso; Josh Kron from Kampala, Uganda; Isma'il Kushkush from Khartoum,
Sudan; and Mohammed Ibrahim from Mogadishu, Somalia.
A version of this article appeared in print on May 3, 2011, on page
F10 of the New York edition with the headline: In East Africa, Relief
and Hope for a 'New Era'.
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