Phone snatching by boda boda riders and mugging by tuk-tuk operators are becoming the biggest security threat in Mombasa County.
The boda boda riders carry one or two ‘pillion passengers’, who snatch people’s phones along the streets.
In extreme cases, especially in deserted streets in areas like Old Town, Mshomoroni, Likoni and Bamburi, the ‘passengers’ alight, brandish a panga and threaten to slash their victim if they don’t surrender their valuables.
They then board the awaiting boda boda and ride away.
In tuk-tuks, at first, the operators used to carry two ‘passengers’ leaving room for a third, mostly targeting females.
The two would sandwich the genuine passengers and rob him or her, dropping them off.
When people noticed the trend, they changed tact.
Now, the tuk-tuk operator looks for a potential victim and convinces them to board.
By this time, the tuk-tuk is empty and the victim is usually the first passenger.
The operator then pretends to have received or makes a call telling the person on the other end they are at a certain place coming to town.
This is usually a signal they have a potential victim.
The other ‘passengers’ are picked along the way, one after the other in different places. The other ‘passengers’ then attack their victim.
Mombasa County Commissioner Mohamed Noor said they have recovered more than 200 phones.
Speaking at a training for Subcounty peace committees hosted by the Kenya Peace and Security Support Initiative (Kepssi) in partnership with the Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) in Mombasa, the county commissioner said all tuk tuks must now be registered into Saccos by January 15.
The registration will help streamline the sector and restore discipline, ensuring the rogue ones are dealt with much like how the National Transport and Safety Authority deals with matatu operators.
“Mombasa County is relatively calm and peaceful because of the cooperation between ourselves and the Subcounty peace committees. The main problem in Mombasa now is phone snatching,” Noor said at the training at Red Cross offices.
He said some phone snatchers work in collusion with the tut-tuk operators.
“That is why all tuk-tuks must be registered in a Sacco or association by mid-January,” he said.
Kepssi chairman Ibrahim Ng’ang’a said the continued cooperation ensures new policies and crime trends that emerge are dealt with as soon as they are detected.
“Just as we have new trends in crime, we also have new policies that aim at dealing with the new crime trends. That is why we have refresher courses for the security sector,” he said.
Ng’ang’a said some of the phone snatchers and tuk-tuk muggers are 14-year-olds. He said the juvenile criminals are school-going children making it challenging to prosecute them because their age does not allow the judicial officers to jail them.
“There are children as young as 10 years old who have joined these juvenile criminal gangs. They are at school during the day and in the streets robbing people during the night,” Ng’ang’a said.
KPA head of security Tonny Kibwana, who has been an advocate of peace, said these children lack mentorship.
“We need to give hope to these children. Some are very talented in different sectors but since they lacked guidance, like from a father figure in the family, they end up picking bad habits from the streets,” Kibwana said.
He said KPA has been trying to promote peace by using sporting activities to harness the talent the children have.
Irene Randu, the Kisauni Subcounty peace committee chairperson, said peace is a process.
“Trends change and what happened in the past is not what is happening now. As time goes, new tactics are formed and applied. That is why we must also be vigilant,” she said.
Randu said parenting is one of the contributory factors to children joining criminal gangs, arguing most of those children that go astray come from dysfunctional families.
“Divorces, single parenting and other family hiccups traumatise our children. That is why they try to find solace in their friends who may behave similar problems. They misguide each other and find themselves in vices,” she said.
County commissioner Noor said
although the security apparatus in
the county has managed to reduce
the cases, more still has to be done.
