It's also essential that mall managers establish a relationship with the local police to make sure they are familiar with the retail property in the event of an incident, said Clark Rice, director of Bellevue Square Managers of Bellevue. "It is critical that you are not introducing yourself to the police chief after it has become a crime scene," he said.

Rice said malls can get a better grasp of less-serious crimes occurring at their centres by collecting data on the location, time and gravity of incidents and analysing it monthly to better allocate their resources.

The deadly terrorist siege at Westgate mall in Nairobi, Kenya, in September has prompted developers, owners and managers in Africa's burgeoning shopping center industry, and their counterparts across the world, to scrutinize their approach to security. The attack killed about 60 people at the 6-year-old Westgate. 

"There is no question that the attack will impact the industry in terms of the ways that we build and operate shopping centers" on the continent, said Irwin Barkan, a U.S. shopping centre developer who in 2010 formed Ghana-based BG International to invest in Africa. His firm is developing centres in Ghana and Nigeria, and Barkan says they will be outfitted with high-tech video surveillance systems and perimeter fences, both of which are already commonplace at many newer malls in Africa. Uniformed guards will have a highly visible presence and, where legal, carry firearms, he said. "The Westgate attack was a message to everybody in the industry all over the world; you can't be a shopping center owner, developer or retailer and not take serious note of it," said Barkan.

Africa's shopping center owners and managers seek to strike a balance between enhancing security and maintaining a welcoming environment, says Marna van der Walt, CEO of South Africa's Excellerate Property Services Group. Many shopping center owners are loath to create airport-like security at entrances to their properties, she says. Rather, they are seeking to step up security through less-obtrusive measures, including installing video surveillance systems that identify individuals behaving suspiciously. Some of these systems also use facial-recognition technology to alert security personnel to the presence of individuals wanted for, or suspected of, crimes or affiliation with terrorist groups.

Airport-like security "is counter-productive to what we want to achieve as a lifestyle environment, but you still have a responsibility to secure shoppers," said van der Walt, adding that many shopping center owners are also drafting disaster recovery plans for potential terrorist attacks.

Barkan though says he sees no evidence that the Westgate attack will curb the appetite of foreign retailers.