Kenya’s insecurity being fed by corruption in the public sector

NAIROBI: In August 2013, President Uhuru Kenyatta publicly announced that the Office of the President (OP) was corrupt and that some officials had created bureaucracy and a national security excuse to loot public coffers. That OP is a den of corruption was not the story but the fact he confirmed insecurity in our nation was inextricably linked to corruption. Rather than use the resources allocated to it for upgrading our security systems, officials in OP routinely used national security cover to loot, reinforcing the nexus between security and corruption.

Corruption networks in the public security sector preceded him. In 2004, President Kenyatta led the Public Accounts Committee that investigated the Anglo Leasing scam that involved 18 security-related contracts in which over Sh54 billion was stolen or unaccounted for. At the time, the committee recommended that itemised budget, and subsequent expenditures by our security forces should be examined by Parliament. A decade later, his administration is attempting to prevent just that. Worse still, Government is fighting tooth and nail to amend the Public Audit Bill to shield the examination of accounts of security agencies.