MILLIONS of dollars worth of shipping and cargo ply the waters of the east African coast every day.
Every vessel runs the risk of hijack after Somalia's notorious pirates resumed business last year, prompting a surge in worldwide piracy figures, according to the latest report by the International Maritime Bureau.
When one of their ships goes mis
sing, the millionaire owners telephone Andrew Mwangura, a former seaman who lives in a two-room shack and relies on internet cafes to communicate with his global network of contacts.
"The ship owners are wealthy but there is nothing for Andrew," he says, sipping a hot chocolate on a Mombasa hotel veranda. He dare not meet journalists at his home for fear his work will attract the wrong kind of attention.
"It doesn't matter because I'm proud that the US or British embassy officials come to meet me. They ask me what I think. That's very good for a common man."
Mr Mwangura, 45, has run the Seafarer's Assistance Programme for the past 12 years, tracking down missing vessels, investigating deaths at sea and negotiating the release of hostages.
He is not paid for his expertise, but survives by working as freelance writer on the side.
At one time he had 40 volunteers working for him, but the number is now nine after his organisation turned out to be riddled with informers.
He has moved from his home in the port of Mombasa up the coast to protect his wife and child.
"The government doesn't like what we do and there are lots of people making money from piracy who would like us out of business," he says.
Somalia's 2,000-mile coastline is one of the most dangerous in the world for shipping.
The country's tentative interim government has little control of its waters, leaving gangs of gunmen free to intercept freighters that come too close to shore.
Piracy was largely stamped out by the Union of Islamic Courts when they seized control of Mogadishu and much of southern Somalia in 2006.
But their defeat by Ethiopian troops at the start of last year has opened the door to the pirates once again.
The International Maritime Bureau says the upsurge here was largely responsible for a worldwide increase in pirate attacks of 10 per cent last year, the first rise in three years.
Mr Mwangura says there were 29 attacks in the last ten months of 2007, compared with two the previous year.
The gangs, he says, are masterminded by crimelords in Dubai and Nairobi who monitor shipping routes for lucrative targets. They pass directions on to as many as five pirate gangs who pay a "licence fee" to Somali politicians or clan elders.
"The majority of the Somali leaders are warlords or mafia-like businessmen connected to pirates, arms smugglers, people-traffickers, illegal fishing, logging," he says. "A thief can't catch a thief."
The first Mr Mwangura hears of a hijack is a phone call from a Somali source or a shipping company desperate to trace a missing vessel.
He uses a network of contacts in Somalia to find the ship and make contact with the hijackers.
"If we can find a cell number for the gunmen and ask to speak to the crew to make sure they are safe, then often we can, as long as we don't give away the position of the ship," he says.
In most cases the crew is released unharmed and the ship is returned to its owners for a ransom of anything from $20,000 to more than $1m.
Mr Mwangura is currently trying to secure the release of two vessels – a local fishing boat and a Danish tug with a British captain that was taken a month ago.
He says he is optimistic that the practice will eventually be brought under control.
Naval detachments from the US, Germany, Britain, Italy and the Netherlands have been patrolling shipping routes and have at times fired on pirate vessels.
Later this month Mr Mwangura, who trained as a marine engineer, is due in Florida for a series of lectures on the subject, but he says he is still surprised by the high profile of the organisation he runs without the help of a secretary, offices or computers.
"We don't have any of that," he adds. "We send a little text message, something that costs five shillings (about 3p] and then suddenly it's big news, with CNN and the BBC calling."
