The Kenya security and intelligence apparatus depends to an overwhelming degree on the effectiveness of its civilian counterpart, the Kenya Police Force. The Kenya police have been on the receiving end of endless opinion polls and studies that label it corrupt, ineffective and outdated. For the thousands of Kenyans who every day are the victims of crime, the Kenya Police is not seen as the solution to their problems, hence the continuing popularity of vigilante justice. Not a week goes by without stories of men and women lynched for committing one crime or the other. The suspended 'police vetting exercise' was met with skepticism and opposition, especially by the human rights lobby in Kenya. They argued that the institution lacked the capacity to vet its own officers and that the exercise would not be able to weed out ineffective officers.
The Constitution creates the new post of Inspector-General of Police, in charge of the Kenya Police Service, the Administration Police, the General Service Unit and other specialised para-military police units such as the CID and the Anti-Stock Theft Unit. Recent high profile crimes have concentrated the minds of Kenyans on the continuing failures of the police to solve these crimes. Blame has been laid, among other things, on the leadership of the police services, where it is alleged that the President and his cronies only wish t place 'their' people at the helm of these agencies to protect their interests. Together with the leadership of the military services, it is presumed that these officers owe their careers to the president and therefore, would not be willing to jeopardise this relationship but would go out of their way to protect it at all costs, even if it means allowing criminals to get away, literally, with murder or the territory of Kenya to be used as a launch-pad for secessionist movements in neighbouring states.
Kenyans' faith in their security and intelligence apparatus has hit an all-time low. However, the challenges facing the police, particularly, do not seem to exercise the same excitement as the campaign to paint them in bad light has. Very few Kenyans shed tears for the policemen who have committed suicide, seeing it as the just deserts for a force that has caused more misery than any other institution in Kenya. This mindset must change if the new police service is to serve the interests of Kenyans. An honest examination of the circumstances surrounding policing in Kenya will show that the police operate in an extremely hostile environment, where corruption is not just limited to traffic cops taking bribes but also policemen paying bribes not to be posted to 'hardship areas'; what they will experience there is truly hardship: poor housing and lack of essential amenities and the total isolation that can only come with keeping them away from their families for months on end. A walk through police lines scattered across the land will demonstrate, as nothing else will, the sacrifices that men in uniform make every day: living conditions that none would wish on his bitterest enemy, congestion that gives rise to the desire for advancement at all costs. When beat cops witness their superiors living it large in Nairobi's suburbs, sending their children to schools that actually have teachers, the desire to bend the system to their own devices is overwhelming. Kenyans pretend that the squalor of policemen's lives is not their concern and complain when their police service is not what it should be. There is a word for this: hypocrisy.
Reforming policing in Kenya will not just be about clarifying the hierarchy of the various units, it must be a complete reorganisation of the way policing is done with a recognition that a good police force is not cheap. Unless and until we pay for the upkeep of a police service, paying a fair price for their services, and until we provide them with the tools, both material and political, to make then as independent as possible, murderers will continue to walk free and billions will continue to be stolen from our nation's coffers.
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