Amid the terror, how  much caution is enough?

In the wake of Tuesday’s bombings and recent incidents, my heart goes out to all family and friends of the bomb victims and the injured who are in hospital or recovering at home. May the good Lord provide comfort to the bereaved and healing to those nursing injuries.
 
Following the attacks, many are shell-shocked. Those who survive tragedies like this are left dealing with trauma and a heightened sense of fear. Being jumpy after the attacks is to be expected. 
In coming days, people carrying bags, abandoned packages and even social media updates may cause panic and have us scampering for cover. 

This is probably a straight giveaway but I was a student in the late 90s when we had a series of bombings around Kampala, in taxi parks and elsewhere. On one of those occasions, I was part of a group of students who had to evacuate the Faculty of Arts quadrangle at Makerere University following a bomb scare. 

We are bound to be looking over our shoulders, around the corner and under our chairs more often after these kinds of traumatic events. Universities have banned the carrying of back packs and other establishments are understandably on high alert. 
The day after the bombings, three transporters with whom I have regular dealings either called to check on me or prayed for my safety in a very heartfelt way. 

We had all been shaken and I could tell that their words came from a deep place; one where we felt we had dodged a bullet, so to speak. 
The day before the bombings I had gone downtown and my route had been past the Central Police Station. One of the guys said he was meant to meet a client just outside Raja Chambers on the day of the bombings but the meeting did not happen. If it had, perhaps his would have been one of the cars going up in flames. 

I was particularly spooked when, minutes after the bomb blasts, I called someone who works at one of the city banks just to check in, only to find out that she had walked away from Jubilee Insurance building minutes before the blasts because her expected meeting did not happen. 

There are many stories like that out there; people who went to have breakfast away from their office or used a different route to work but there are just as many cases of people who were caught up in the blasts and their aftermath, people who had to contemplate the prospect of death in that moment; people who have lived the panic of fleeing a bomb scene. 

I cannot even begin to imagine what they are going through. Yet we are being called upon to resume life as we knew it before Tuesday. What will that even look like for those mobile money agents who are carrying around the horrors they witnessed on the street this week? 
What does normal look like for the people who must return to their jobs and walk past the places where others had their lives snuffed out of them and where they themselves could have been but for some stroke of luck? 

Is it enough to have more security on the streets and will stopping students from carrying their bags into university campuses help? Many measures have been put up and proposed in the aftermath of Tuesday, but how much caution is enough and what will it take to make us feel safe again? 
That is one of the toughest questions to answer after a terror attack.

Ms Nampewo is a writer, editor and communications consultant     
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