Considering that Kenya airport fire

In the days before its occurrence, the airwaves were full of announcements of flights to safety by American diplomatic staff from all predominantly Muslim-Arab countries across North Africa, including Sudan. Britain and France followed in tow. The American government claimed that their intelligence operatives had intercepted dialogue between top leaders of Al Qaeda which suggested […]

In the days before its occurrence, the airwaves were full of announcements of flights to safety by American diplomatic staff from all predominantly Muslim-Arab countries across North Africa, including Sudan. Britain and France followed in tow. The American government claimed that their intelligence operatives had intercepted dialogue between top leaders of Al Qaeda which suggested that the end of Ramadan would be marked by attacks on American embassies whose magnitude would either equal or surpass September 11, 2011 attacks in New York and Washington, DC.
Considering the recent support lent to Kenya by the American government for a war in Somalia against Al Shabaab – an Al Qaeda affiliate – it would be assumed that the Americans would have nudged Kenya’s security officials to watch their vital resources. Yemen, for example, claims that they prevented an attempt to capture a major oil exporting port.
There is a lingering bitterness among Kenyans that in the 1988 bombing of the American embassy in Nairobi, more Kenyans than Americans died; and American rescuers denied help to wounded Kenyans. The high fatalities among Kenyans included employees. One hopes that intelligence was shared with Kenyans at the point of prevention in the name of equality in the value of human life.
There is a possibility that warning passed to Kenya’s security operatives may have yielded a much unexpected effect. Media reports to the New York Times by Kenyan reporters claim that “fire fighting efforts were hampered by some of the first respondents choosing to loot the airport instead of fighting the blaze”. Money in local and foreign currencies were found on the seven police officers who supervised reinforcements sent in from the military, G4S, the National Youth Service, Kenya Airports Authority and other agencies. Detectives found the money in their possession. Sellers of alcohol, electronics, textiles, beverages like coffee and tea were major losers. This was only part of what President Uhuru Kenyatta called “negligence from all quarters”. There was a collapse of suitable institutional behaviour.
The fire is reported to have started as a small creeping burn.  According to a spokesman for the Entebbe-based East African Civil Aviation Safety and Security Oversight Agency (Cassoa), fire fighters should have been only three minutes away. It however took over three hours before fire fighting trucks arrived. There is reason to assume that the airport became a victim of its own history with accidents. Since 20 November 1974 when a Lufthansa flight 540  carrying 157 passengers headed for Johannesburg from Frankfurt in Germany crashed on take-off from the airport, there continued to be aircraft related incidences. In the Lufthansa disaster 59 passengers died. Its next accident on 17 May 1989 involved a Boeing 707 plane used by Somali Airbus. It aborted its take-off and skidded in rain into a field. There were no deaths. On 4 December 1990 another Boeing 707 used by Sudania Air Cargo hit an electricity pole five kilometres short of the runway. It killed all 10 persons on board. On 6 June 2012, an Egypt Air plane blew a tire as it landed. None of its 123 passengers was injured. A chunk of the aircraft broke off and blocked the runway. All these cases did not affect buildings of the airport.  
Whatever the basis of the induced “complacency”, it was occurring at a time of international alarm raised by an ally who had been attacked on Kenyan soil. The home airline which reported losing four million US dollars on the first day – including an obligation to bring to Nairobi 492 passengers trapped in Hong Kong alone – should have been a prime vigilant stakeholder in matters of ensuring the adequacy and effective readiness of fire fighting resources. Heathrow Airport in London has a fire and police station each on the east and west wings of the airport. These “international best practices” should have been ensured by the regional oversight authorities as well as the pan-African aviation body.
The shameful behaviour of police officers and other respondents in bending to the lure of funds to be looted came at a time of sustained protests by NGOs against members of parliament allocating outrageous salaries and other perks to themselves. Most of them are anxious that they may not be re-elected. As high as two billion Kenya shillings had already “been disbursed to parliamentarians, all 290 of them, for the purpose of luxury-car loans”. The multiplier effect of official corruption must corrode cultures of accountability in the use of public funds in a country where the majority are caught up in their “luxury in poverty”. The police officers who saw a window for looting were probably under the influence of that virus. If a virus that attacks leaves of a tomato arouses communication of the danger to other tomato plants (so that they can protect themselves), so can the inverse process happen between two human groups.
In 2011 there were tussles between factions in President Mwai Kibaki’s cabinet over the award of contracts for the construction of an additional section to the airport. It would handle 2.5 million passengers annually. A Chinese company was favoured by one group while a British company had its allies too. The contract was valued at 111.8 million dollars.
Another contract has been awarded for rehabilitating the current facilities. It is to be hoped that losers did not respond with a song of arson. When corruption from abroad mixes with its local variant, its explosive inclination may start fires even to our most vital infrastructures.