Kenya - TROUBLE IN PARADISE
25 mins 00 secs 5 January 2004
Pictures
COMM & sync
Tease
At first sight, this is every tourists dream.
JR PTC: Looks deserted.
But for Kenya these empty beaches are a disaster.
Last November suicide bombers thought to be from an Al Qaeda cell blew up an Israeli-owned hotel and killed 14 people.
American and British travel companies cancelled their bookings, and many have not returned.
The Kenyan tourist industry has become a casualty of terrorism - and the War on Terror.
TITLE: TROUBLE IN PARADISE
Mombasa and its beaches form the heart of Kenyas tourist industry. Most people who live here are Muslim: descendants of Arab traders whove used this port for centuries.
The citys police have taken to sweeping through poor neighbourhoods and imprisoning anyone. Theyre looking for firearms, illegal immigrants - and above all, terrorists.
JR PTC: A lot of people have been rounded up in town this morning and right in front of me theres a crowd waiting in front of the police station looking for their arrested relatives.
The police tactics are causing a public outcry.
Man: This police system is very bad
But Kenyas new government, elected last December, is facing a crisis. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Man: Come, come madam.
JR: So they're being released now.
Man: Come madam, come.
(No comm)
Man: Here are the ladies which are released. You see they're very poor. You see, they're very poor. They don't have money.
JR: Can you help me talk to them?
Man: Yes. Excuse me madam!
People were complaining they had to pay bribes for the police to release their relatives.
JR: Swahili So this lady is saying this wasnt the first time they took her in and made her stay in jail. Its been the second time ..she was just saying its easy to snatch someone like her, shes got no work, shes got no rights .one of the children who was taken in, hes four and a half. The little one is two years old ..
Crowd: (Swahili)
JR PTC: I just wanted to know how many people they took this morning and this lady was saying the whole prison was full, it was incredibly crowded. She says 500.
Man: In five cells. Five cells.
A few minutes later my colleague and I were hauled into the police station.
JR PTC: We've just spent a whole hour in the police station. We were filming outside with the crowd. Suddenly they came and grabbed the director cameraman, grabbed him at his neck, pulled him us into the police station, everybody started shouting at us. Somebody had a big stick and they said 'what are you doing here?' and it was a sort of half arrest.
Mombasas half a million inhabitants have a reputation not just for religious tolerance, but for being cosmopolitan.
Muslims send their children across the Arabian Sea to be educated in the Middle East. Arabs marry into families here.
Al Qaeda has exploited these ties to plant terrorists in the coastal community.
JR PTC: We're just coming up to the Paradise, which is the Israeli hotel where the bomb went off last November.
The hotel watchman refused to let me in but told me what happened here.
Man: The cars coming with lights in high speed more than 120, 160.
JR: Is that why the gate is so dented just there?
Man: Yah, we're African, we don't know because it's our first time in Kenya to see something like that. So we are wondering what is going on. We want to know.
PARADISE ARCHIVE
Check figures
The blast killed three Israeli tourists and eleven Kenyan musicians and dancers who worked at the hotel. Scores of people were injured.
JR: What effect has this bomb had on tourism?
Man: British Airways stopped here, American Airways stopped. So that is the problem. So many people suffering. Coz if you're working in the hotel and you don't have a job. So what you will to survive?
JR: (in Swahili).
Man: Yeah, it's a very hard life, but what shall we do?
Nearby was Msumarini, a village that had once supplied many of the workers for the Paradise Hotel. Since the attack most of its men have left, looking for work to feed their families.
JR PTC: Ali Baba's just saying that at the point of time that the bomb went off, the workers at the Paradise were actually owed 3 months salary money, and that is money they never received.
I was introduced to Kadzo Masha. The bomb had killed her daughter Pendo.
JR PTC: Her daughter actually worked in the Paradise Hotel as a dancer together with a drumming group that was welcoming tourists as they arrived, and she was the sole bread winner for the family.
(no comm)
JR PTC: This is where her daughter's buried. It's all overgrown now.
She was a casualty of a war of which she knew nothing about
JR: (Swahili).
Woman: (Swahili)
JR PTC: I juts wanted to know who she thinks put the bomb in the Paradise Hotel, and she says she's got absolutely no idea.
Whole communities had depended on the Paradise Hotel.
JR PTC: Ali was just saying that a lot of these houses around us are empty because the people who used to live here used to work in the tourist trade, and they've gone away to different places because they lost their jobs and couldn't find new ones when the hotels closed down.
Dama Yaa lost her husband Safari in the bomb blast.
Woman: (Swahili)
JR (simultaneous translation): She was saying that tourism was such as good thing. Here husband was playing in the performing band in the Paradise Hotel, and they had enough to eat for all the kids.
JR (translation to camera): But now the bomb has gone off and no tourists are coming back, what is there for them to do?
Woman: (Swahili)
JR (simultaneous translation): She said her situation seems hopeless because she already had nine children when her husband died, and she was pregnant with the tenth kid, and the tenth kid is now born, and she's looking after all of them, but has very little to feed them with.
The effect of the bomb at the Paradise Hotel goes far beyond the personal tragedies and poverty its caused in the nearby villages.
We left Mombasa, taking the ferry across the Likoni River.
Along the south coast are the resort hotels that depend on charter flights from Britain and other charter countries.
Hotel porter: It's your first time?
JR: Yes.
Hotel porter: Oh, you're most welcome.
JR: Thank you.
In May the America banned its flights to Kenya. The British did the same. They felt the Kenyans werent doing enough to protect tourists.
And they feared further attacks. After Bali, they werent taking any chances.
For the half a million the results have been.
JR PTC: Not exactly busy.
We took a stroll along the beach. The only people we met were some out-of-work acrobats.
JR PTC: There are all these jobs that you never think about when you think of the tourist industry.
(No Comm)
JR: What do people do to survive if they can't work in the tourist industry? What other work is there?
Acrobat: Here? Normally the jobless people, yah. Before there's no tourists, so we close down our acrobatic show and just hang in to the village.
Acrobat: Aya! Hakuna matata. Jambo!
JR: OK, thanks a lot. Bye!
According to the Kenyan Foreign Minister, the British and American flight bans handed victory to the terrorists on a plate.
Silvia and Harald Kampa are a German couple whove spent most of their lives in Kenya. They own two of the large hotels further along the beach.
JR: But it does feel like a ghost hotel at the moment.
Kampas: Yup, yup.
After the flight ban they were forced to close this hotel entirely.
Harald Kampa: It would be very busy here right now, but as you can see there is simply nobody.
Mrs K: We have stored the furniture here for the time being.
JR: So can you remember what immediately happened when the travel ban was issued? How did you notice that, being a hotel manager? What happened?
HK: The morning after, when I retrieved my e-mail, I saw about 15 emails popping up, and when I opened them I found in all of them 'please cancel', 'please cancel', 'please cancel', and like this it went on every day about 15 cancellations for the next 2 weeks.
HK: The only guest!
JR: Your only guest, yuh!
The Kampas have kept their other hotel open to cater to German and Swiss tourists. But theyve had to sack over a hundred staff, and theyre struggling to pay those who remain.
HK: I think this threat is mainly taking place in the heads of the people. It's not really physically there. There is no difference in the threat between Kenya for example and the threat of terrorism in UK, or in the United States or in Germany. The threat is overall there, but it's not that there is a bigger threat here in Kenya.
Pan to church
Behind the hotels is the township of Ukunda. The Kampas had told us wed find some of their unemployed workers at Sunday worship.
Desperation fills the churches. Along the coast at least 15% of hotel workers have been laid off. Almost all employees have had their salaries delayed for 3 months. We met one of them.
Over JR's shoulder into charcoal store
JR: This is your place?
Jacob: Yah, this is where I am.
JR: OK.
Jacob: So this is the stock.
Jacob was a hotel security guard. Now hes selling charcoal to feed a family of nine. But no one has the cash to pay him.
Jacob: I have to write them down, the debtors. So somebody can pay you, like this one, see this one, he paid 60, and again he ??, it was 40, and now he's having the balance of 20 shillings. I want my kids to eat, I have to persevere. However difficult it is, however hard it is, I have to be here.
Jacob took me to meet his customers.
JR: This is the market?
Jacob: Yah, this is the market. People can sit the whole day. There is nothing. We go this side.
JR: They're not selling anything just now?
Jacob: Yah. Everybody's affected.
JR: This café's closed down completely?
Jacob: It's closed (then Swahili to local).
Jacob had hoped to sell a bag of charcoal to one of the cafes.
.Jacob to JR: He's having no money, so I can't bring him .
JR to shop owner: (Swahili)
Shop owner (Swahili)
JR to shop owner: So you need charcoal. OK.
JR translation to camera: So he does need charcoal, he's saying, but he can't pay for it at the moment because the business in his café isn't very good.
Jacob: You can see people are just sitting, they're not eating.
AIDS awareness Rap event
As we left, we passed a hip hop group warning against the dangers of AIDS. The German charity funding the concert is concerned that economic collapse has led to an increase in prostitution.
POV arriving at Leisure Golf Club, GVs
A mile up the road, a new conference centre and golf course had just opened.
To mark the occasion its owners were holding a golf tournament for the local movers and shakers in the tourist industry.
Among them was Raymond Matiba, the chairman of the Kenya Tourism Board.
Hes adamant that the Al Qaeda bombs in Mombasa and Bali have changed the travel industry for ever.
Raymond Matiba: The world of tourism as we knew it has completely changed. We will always have to be vigilant, there will always have to be extra security at tourists sites because they are vulnerable, and that's exactly the sort of place people who want to create terror will gravitate to and carry out those atrocities. So I think the whole tourism system is going to have to change, it's going to be completely new.
JR: And not just in Kenya.
RM: And not just in Kenya. Internationally.
Suddenly news broke that further along the coast four hotels were on fire. We wondered whether terrorists had struck again.
Drive to burning hotels on north coast
JR PTC: You can really start smelling the smoke.
(Nat Sound)
Drive to Mombasa
At first they wouldnt let us into the complex. Then they relented.
It was spectacular, but it wasnt terrorism. The newspapers speculated that the blaze had been started by hotel workers whod lost their jobs.
Police checkpoints lined the road back to Mombasa.
Everyone knows Kenya cant afford another bomb.
In the city Muslim leaders had organised a protest against police tactics in the War on Terror.
The Kenyan Government is under pressure to show America and Britain its doing everything it can to hunt down terrorists.
These Muslims say theyre paying the price in arbitrary arrest and police harrassment.
Muslim prayer gathering set-up
JR PTC: I've just been told that the prayers are about to start, so I'll have to wait in the women's section further down that way.
After the prayers came the speeches.
Speaker: (Swahili)
This speaker talked of a clash of civilisations between Islam and the West. Were called terrorists so we can be targeted, he said. We must take a stand.
As he spoke a collection was taken to support the families of men arrested on suspicion of involvement in the Paradise Hotel bombing.
JR PTC: I've just met one of the organisers of this event, Sheikh Dor, and he said he's going to take me to the wives of some men, Muslim men, who they say have been unfairly arrested.
Only one of the wives agreed to an interview.
Veiled woman: (Swahili)
JR translation to camera: Kusna was just saying that she's actually the wife of somebody who's been arrested by the government. She says they took him, there are no witnesses, there are no circumstances that anyone can understand that have led to this arrest. She says she's had a very hard time since there's been no money coming in, her children aren't going to school because they can't afford the school fees, and she says this whole thing is a huge injustice against which she can't do anything.
Other woman: (Swahili)
Then her cousin intervened.
JR PTC: They're really blaming the Kenyan government for unfair treatment. They're saying the husbands were arrested on suspicions, and then had to be released because that didn't stand up in front of court. And then immediately after the release they were re-arrested, and are charged on charges of terrorism. And they've gone to Nairobi, tried to see them, but since they've been arrested for the second time they've had no access to their husbands at all.
There had been anger at Al Qaeda for sparking this situation; but it was now being eclipsed by outrage at the governments tactics.
We cry, we express our views, nothing happen. Those people came here, foreigners, they came to bomb Paradise, and then they are blaming us. Why?
Thats a question Muslims in Kenya are asking all the time.
Madrassar scene
They know that Al Qaeda has done them great harm.
But some also fear that pledging allegiance to the war on terror means a betrayal of their Muslim identity.
I met one of the rallys backers. Abdullah Ahmed finds it hard to condemn Al Qaeda, especially as he is critical of tourists and the values they bring.
WS JR sitting with Abdullah
Abdullah: Tourism may have suffered, and it has affected, you know, quite a large segment of the population, but at the same time this same large segment of the population, a similar large segment, was actually being harmed by tourism, you know, so this is not my haunt to deal with, that is the dilemma for the Kenyan government to try and tackle if they can. But they cannot, cannot improve security or make Muslim areas safe if what they're doing on a day to day basis is antagonising us. They can't do it, and they need to realise that, they really need to realise that and find a way out of this mess they've put themselves into.
JR: But are you offering the Kenyan government collaboration?
Abdullah: No, no. Collaboration for what? You're fighting Islam and Muslims. Why should Muslims collaborate with you in fighting Islam and Muslims. No, there shall be no collaboration. We ourselves as Muslims, we talk to our Muslims and tell them always control your actions with Islam and fall within the Islamic limits. We do it because it's our duty, but we're not going to sell out our Muslim brothers or be seen as collaborators in order to gain some sort of short-term interest. No, this won't take place.
Sundown GV Mombasa, dusk GV Fort Jesus, tourists walking in after dark
Thats one voice. But many Muslims disagree.
Each night as tourists enter the Old Town in Mombasa, a group of Muslims meet beneath its walls.
Theyre from Kisheso, a volunteer group that draws from all walks of life that polices the Old Town.
They see tourism as vital to their community and fear the damage terrorism can do to it.
Man briefs group (Swahili)
Man: Some of our boys are not here with us. They happen to be undercover, and they would never come up and declare themselves as part of our group. So in case an incident took place, there would be somebody somewhere who would see something and he can immediately come to the boss and report and say exactly who is the culprit.
Group enters Old Town, POV walking along dark street
That night, as we patrolled with Kisheso, a man approached us. He said many Kenyans Muslims want to see the back of the terrorists and he was one of them.
Feisal grenade archive shot on 1 Aug 03
He said hed been involved in an incident that made headlines just a month before. Hed received a tip-off . It resulted in the police tracking down two Al Qaeda suspects linked to the Paradise Hotel bombing. It should have been a big break for the police. But one of the men whos on the FBIs most wanted list escaped. The other blew himself up and a policeman with a hand grenade. .
GV coastline near Mombasa, silhouette in room
The next day we met our informer again. He wanted us to know his motives.
Man in silhouette: There's no place in the Koran that mentions suicide bombing, or in any way blowing yourselves up and killing innocent people. These are fanatics. These are not Muslims. It's high time people should know Muslims are not involved, and neither is Islam involved in this thing. These are just fanatics using Islam as a scapegoat. We hope Al Qaeda will not survive here.
Britain has now lifted its travel ban. America has not. Charter companies and tourists remain nervous. Kenyas beaches are still empty.
Throughout the world, wherever tourists go, terrorists can follow.
Mombasa will not be the last troubled paradise.
25 mins 00 secs 5 January 2004
Pictures
COMM & sync
Tease
At first sight, this is every tourists dream.
JR PTC: Looks deserted.
But for Kenya these empty beaches are a disaster.
Last November suicide bombers thought to be from an Al Qaeda cell blew up an Israeli-owned hotel and killed 14 people.
American and British travel companies cancelled their bookings, and many have not returned.
The Kenyan tourist industry has become a casualty of terrorism - and the War on Terror.
TITLE: TROUBLE IN PARADISE
Mombasa and its beaches form the heart of Kenyas tourist industry. Most people who live here are Muslim: descendants of Arab traders whove used this port for centuries.
The citys police have taken to sweeping through poor neighbourhoods and imprisoning anyone. Theyre looking for firearms, illegal immigrants - and above all, terrorists.
JR PTC: A lot of people have been rounded up in town this morning and right in front of me theres a crowd waiting in front of the police station looking for their arrested relatives.
The police tactics are causing a public outcry.
Man: This police system is very bad
But Kenyas new government, elected last December, is facing a crisis. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Man: Come, come madam.
JR: So they're being released now.
Man: Come madam, come.
(No comm)
Man: Here are the ladies which are released. You see they're very poor. You see, they're very poor. They don't have money.
JR: Can you help me talk to them?
Man: Yes. Excuse me madam!
People were complaining they had to pay bribes for the police to release their relatives.
JR: Swahili So this lady is saying this wasnt the first time they took her in and made her stay in jail. Its been the second time ..she was just saying its easy to snatch someone like her, shes got no work, shes got no rights .one of the children who was taken in, hes four and a half. The little one is two years old ..
Crowd: (Swahili)
JR PTC: I just wanted to know how many people they took this morning and this lady was saying the whole prison was full, it was incredibly crowded. She says 500.
Man: In five cells. Five cells.
A few minutes later my colleague and I were hauled into the police station.
JR PTC: We've just spent a whole hour in the police station. We were filming outside with the crowd. Suddenly they came and grabbed the director cameraman, grabbed him at his neck, pulled him us into the police station, everybody started shouting at us. Somebody had a big stick and they said 'what are you doing here?' and it was a sort of half arrest.
Mombasas half a million inhabitants have a reputation not just for religious tolerance, but for being cosmopolitan.
Muslims send their children across the Arabian Sea to be educated in the Middle East. Arabs marry into families here.
Al Qaeda has exploited these ties to plant terrorists in the coastal community.
JR PTC: We're just coming up to the Paradise, which is the Israeli hotel where the bomb went off last November.
The hotel watchman refused to let me in but told me what happened here.
Man: The cars coming with lights in high speed more than 120, 160.
JR: Is that why the gate is so dented just there?
Man: Yah, we're African, we don't know because it's our first time in Kenya to see something like that. So we are wondering what is going on. We want to know.
PARADISE ARCHIVE
Check figures
The blast killed three Israeli tourists and eleven Kenyan musicians and dancers who worked at the hotel. Scores of people were injured.
JR: What effect has this bomb had on tourism?
Man: British Airways stopped here, American Airways stopped. So that is the problem. So many people suffering. Coz if you're working in the hotel and you don't have a job. So what you will to survive?
JR: (in Swahili).
Man: Yeah, it's a very hard life, but what shall we do?
Nearby was Msumarini, a village that had once supplied many of the workers for the Paradise Hotel. Since the attack most of its men have left, looking for work to feed their families.
JR PTC: Ali Baba's just saying that at the point of time that the bomb went off, the workers at the Paradise were actually owed 3 months salary money, and that is money they never received.
I was introduced to Kadzo Masha. The bomb had killed her daughter Pendo.
JR PTC: Her daughter actually worked in the Paradise Hotel as a dancer together with a drumming group that was welcoming tourists as they arrived, and she was the sole bread winner for the family.
(no comm)
JR PTC: This is where her daughter's buried. It's all overgrown now.
She was a casualty of a war of which she knew nothing about
JR: (Swahili).
Woman: (Swahili)
JR PTC: I juts wanted to know who she thinks put the bomb in the Paradise Hotel, and she says she's got absolutely no idea.
Whole communities had depended on the Paradise Hotel.
JR PTC: Ali was just saying that a lot of these houses around us are empty because the people who used to live here used to work in the tourist trade, and they've gone away to different places because they lost their jobs and couldn't find new ones when the hotels closed down.
Dama Yaa lost her husband Safari in the bomb blast.
Woman: (Swahili)
JR (simultaneous translation): She was saying that tourism was such as good thing. Here husband was playing in the performing band in the Paradise Hotel, and they had enough to eat for all the kids.
JR (translation to camera): But now the bomb has gone off and no tourists are coming back, what is there for them to do?
Woman: (Swahili)
JR (simultaneous translation): She said her situation seems hopeless because she already had nine children when her husband died, and she was pregnant with the tenth kid, and the tenth kid is now born, and she's looking after all of them, but has very little to feed them with.
The effect of the bomb at the Paradise Hotel goes far beyond the personal tragedies and poverty its caused in the nearby villages.
We left Mombasa, taking the ferry across the Likoni River.
Along the south coast are the resort hotels that depend on charter flights from Britain and other charter countries.
Hotel porter: It's your first time?
JR: Yes.
Hotel porter: Oh, you're most welcome.
JR: Thank you.
In May the America banned its flights to Kenya. The British did the same. They felt the Kenyans werent doing enough to protect tourists.
And they feared further attacks. After Bali, they werent taking any chances.
For the half a million the results have been.
JR PTC: Not exactly busy.
We took a stroll along the beach. The only people we met were some out-of-work acrobats.
JR PTC: There are all these jobs that you never think about when you think of the tourist industry.
(No Comm)
JR: What do people do to survive if they can't work in the tourist industry? What other work is there?
Acrobat: Here? Normally the jobless people, yah. Before there's no tourists, so we close down our acrobatic show and just hang in to the village.
Acrobat: Aya! Hakuna matata. Jambo!
JR: OK, thanks a lot. Bye!
According to the Kenyan Foreign Minister, the British and American flight bans handed victory to the terrorists on a plate.
Silvia and Harald Kampa are a German couple whove spent most of their lives in Kenya. They own two of the large hotels further along the beach.
JR: But it does feel like a ghost hotel at the moment.
Kampas: Yup, yup.
After the flight ban they were forced to close this hotel entirely.
Harald Kampa: It would be very busy here right now, but as you can see there is simply nobody.
Mrs K: We have stored the furniture here for the time being.
JR: So can you remember what immediately happened when the travel ban was issued? How did you notice that, being a hotel manager? What happened?
HK: The morning after, when I retrieved my e-mail, I saw about 15 emails popping up, and when I opened them I found in all of them 'please cancel', 'please cancel', 'please cancel', and like this it went on every day about 15 cancellations for the next 2 weeks.
HK: The only guest!
JR: Your only guest, yuh!
The Kampas have kept their other hotel open to cater to German and Swiss tourists. But theyve had to sack over a hundred staff, and theyre struggling to pay those who remain.
HK: I think this threat is mainly taking place in the heads of the people. It's not really physically there. There is no difference in the threat between Kenya for example and the threat of terrorism in UK, or in the United States or in Germany. The threat is overall there, but it's not that there is a bigger threat here in Kenya.
Pan to church
Behind the hotels is the township of Ukunda. The Kampas had told us wed find some of their unemployed workers at Sunday worship.
Desperation fills the churches. Along the coast at least 15% of hotel workers have been laid off. Almost all employees have had their salaries delayed for 3 months. We met one of them.
Over JR's shoulder into charcoal store
JR: This is your place?
Jacob: Yah, this is where I am.
JR: OK.
Jacob: So this is the stock.
Jacob was a hotel security guard. Now hes selling charcoal to feed a family of nine. But no one has the cash to pay him.
Jacob: I have to write them down, the debtors. So somebody can pay you, like this one, see this one, he paid 60, and again he ??, it was 40, and now he's having the balance of 20 shillings. I want my kids to eat, I have to persevere. However difficult it is, however hard it is, I have to be here.
Jacob took me to meet his customers.
JR: This is the market?
Jacob: Yah, this is the market. People can sit the whole day. There is nothing. We go this side.
JR: They're not selling anything just now?
Jacob: Yah. Everybody's affected.
JR: This café's closed down completely?
Jacob: It's closed (then Swahili to local).
Jacob had hoped to sell a bag of charcoal to one of the cafes.
.Jacob to JR: He's having no money, so I can't bring him .
JR to shop owner: (Swahili)
Shop owner (Swahili)
JR to shop owner: So you need charcoal. OK.
JR translation to camera: So he does need charcoal, he's saying, but he can't pay for it at the moment because the business in his café isn't very good.
Jacob: You can see people are just sitting, they're not eating.
AIDS awareness Rap event
As we left, we passed a hip hop group warning against the dangers of AIDS. The German charity funding the concert is concerned that economic collapse has led to an increase in prostitution.
POV arriving at Leisure Golf Club, GVs
A mile up the road, a new conference centre and golf course had just opened.
To mark the occasion its owners were holding a golf tournament for the local movers and shakers in the tourist industry.
Among them was Raymond Matiba, the chairman of the Kenya Tourism Board.
Hes adamant that the Al Qaeda bombs in Mombasa and Bali have changed the travel industry for ever.
Raymond Matiba: The world of tourism as we knew it has completely changed. We will always have to be vigilant, there will always have to be extra security at tourists sites because they are vulnerable, and that's exactly the sort of place people who want to create terror will gravitate to and carry out those atrocities. So I think the whole tourism system is going to have to change, it's going to be completely new.
JR: And not just in Kenya.
RM: And not just in Kenya. Internationally.
Suddenly news broke that further along the coast four hotels were on fire. We wondered whether terrorists had struck again.
Drive to burning hotels on north coast
JR PTC: You can really start smelling the smoke.
(Nat Sound)
Drive to Mombasa
At first they wouldnt let us into the complex. Then they relented.
It was spectacular, but it wasnt terrorism. The newspapers speculated that the blaze had been started by hotel workers whod lost their jobs.
Police checkpoints lined the road back to Mombasa.
Everyone knows Kenya cant afford another bomb.
In the city Muslim leaders had organised a protest against police tactics in the War on Terror.
The Kenyan Government is under pressure to show America and Britain its doing everything it can to hunt down terrorists.
These Muslims say theyre paying the price in arbitrary arrest and police harrassment.
Muslim prayer gathering set-up
JR PTC: I've just been told that the prayers are about to start, so I'll have to wait in the women's section further down that way.
After the prayers came the speeches.
Speaker: (Swahili)
This speaker talked of a clash of civilisations between Islam and the West. Were called terrorists so we can be targeted, he said. We must take a stand.
As he spoke a collection was taken to support the families of men arrested on suspicion of involvement in the Paradise Hotel bombing.
JR PTC: I've just met one of the organisers of this event, Sheikh Dor, and he said he's going to take me to the wives of some men, Muslim men, who they say have been unfairly arrested.
Only one of the wives agreed to an interview.
Veiled woman: (Swahili)
JR translation to camera: Kusna was just saying that she's actually the wife of somebody who's been arrested by the government. She says they took him, there are no witnesses, there are no circumstances that anyone can understand that have led to this arrest. She says she's had a very hard time since there's been no money coming in, her children aren't going to school because they can't afford the school fees, and she says this whole thing is a huge injustice against which she can't do anything.
Other woman: (Swahili)
Then her cousin intervened.
JR PTC: They're really blaming the Kenyan government for unfair treatment. They're saying the husbands were arrested on suspicions, and then had to be released because that didn't stand up in front of court. And then immediately after the release they were re-arrested, and are charged on charges of terrorism. And they've gone to Nairobi, tried to see them, but since they've been arrested for the second time they've had no access to their husbands at all.
There had been anger at Al Qaeda for sparking this situation; but it was now being eclipsed by outrage at the governments tactics.
We cry, we express our views, nothing happen. Those people came here, foreigners, they came to bomb Paradise, and then they are blaming us. Why?
Thats a question Muslims in Kenya are asking all the time.
Madrassar scene
They know that Al Qaeda has done them great harm.
But some also fear that pledging allegiance to the war on terror means a betrayal of their Muslim identity.
I met one of the rallys backers. Abdullah Ahmed finds it hard to condemn Al Qaeda, especially as he is critical of tourists and the values they bring.
WS JR sitting with Abdullah
Abdullah: Tourism may have suffered, and it has affected, you know, quite a large segment of the population, but at the same time this same large segment of the population, a similar large segment, was actually being harmed by tourism, you know, so this is not my haunt to deal with, that is the dilemma for the Kenyan government to try and tackle if they can. But they cannot, cannot improve security or make Muslim areas safe if what they're doing on a day to day basis is antagonising us. They can't do it, and they need to realise that, they really need to realise that and find a way out of this mess they've put themselves into.
JR: But are you offering the Kenyan government collaboration?
Abdullah: No, no. Collaboration for what? You're fighting Islam and Muslims. Why should Muslims collaborate with you in fighting Islam and Muslims. No, there shall be no collaboration. We ourselves as Muslims, we talk to our Muslims and tell them always control your actions with Islam and fall within the Islamic limits. We do it because it's our duty, but we're not going to sell out our Muslim brothers or be seen as collaborators in order to gain some sort of short-term interest. No, this won't take place.
Sundown GV Mombasa, dusk GV Fort Jesus, tourists walking in after dark
Thats one voice. But many Muslims disagree.
Each night as tourists enter the Old Town in Mombasa, a group of Muslims meet beneath its walls.
Theyre from Kisheso, a volunteer group that draws from all walks of life that polices the Old Town.
They see tourism as vital to their community and fear the damage terrorism can do to it.
Man briefs group (Swahili)
Man: Some of our boys are not here with us. They happen to be undercover, and they would never come up and declare themselves as part of our group. So in case an incident took place, there would be somebody somewhere who would see something and he can immediately come to the boss and report and say exactly who is the culprit.
Group enters Old Town, POV walking along dark street
That night, as we patrolled with Kisheso, a man approached us. He said many Kenyans Muslims want to see the back of the terrorists and he was one of them.
Feisal grenade archive shot on 1 Aug 03
He said hed been involved in an incident that made headlines just a month before. Hed received a tip-off . It resulted in the police tracking down two Al Qaeda suspects linked to the Paradise Hotel bombing. It should have been a big break for the police. But one of the men whos on the FBIs most wanted list escaped. The other blew himself up and a policeman with a hand grenade. .
GV coastline near Mombasa, silhouette in room
The next day we met our informer again. He wanted us to know his motives.
Man in silhouette: There's no place in the Koran that mentions suicide bombing, or in any way blowing yourselves up and killing innocent people. These are fanatics. These are not Muslims. It's high time people should know Muslims are not involved, and neither is Islam involved in this thing. These are just fanatics using Islam as a scapegoat. We hope Al Qaeda will not survive here.
Britain has now lifted its travel ban. America has not. Charter companies and tourists remain nervous. Kenyas beaches are still empty.
Throughout the world, wherever tourists go, terrorists can follow.
Mombasa will not be the last troubled paradise.