What really ails Kenya Police Service

Kenya: The Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) released its report on a recent police operation concentrated mainly in Eastleigh area of Nairobi. Dubbed "Usalama Watch," its objection was inter alia; to flush out Al–Shabaab operatives and adherents besides searching for various kinds of weapons including improvsed electronic devices (IEDs).

In sum, it was to disrupt, detect and probably forestall terrorist attacks.

Noble as those intentions may be, the operation was marred by numerous claims of irregularity and even outright criminality. IPOA is a creation of the Independent Policing Oversight Authority Act no 35 of 2011.

Primarily, the authority is to make the National Police Service accountable to the public in the performance of their duties.

Such bodies and many others brought forth by the new order springing from the letter and spirit of Constitution of Kenya (2010).

At the core of our constitution is the Bill of Rights.

In this case, Chapter 4 is the essence of our constitution.

The other chapters provide the infrastructure via which the Bill of Rights is to be actualised.

Unknown to some public servants, the ground shifted from exercise of power to the service of the citizen.

IPOA is concerned that the police officer is someone to be feared and avoided as opposed to being expected and welcome.

During Usalama Watch, people of Somali ethnic group saw police as people to run away from.

Lack of a clear command structure also meant that multiple home and property searches would be done by various arms of the police service.

Each arm; General Service Unit (GSU), Administration Police (AP), Regular Police would operate as separate entities hence piling to the agony of their "victims."

The report tasks the Inspector General to come up with clear structures of command and operation so as make for efficient execution of duties.

Unless the police are properly educated on the theoretical foundation and philosophical rational of their mandate, little much is expected from them.

Considering that the body politic remains more or less stuck in the neo-colonial rut, the only salvation is constant vigilance and strict application of the law.

 

Kenya teems with well meaning people who not only yearn for a new order but are also willing to pay the price for that said new order.

This group of people continue to work hard not because of but in spite of a retrogressive socio-political environment. Bodies like IPOA, Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC), Commission for Revenue Allocation (CRA) and many more and our gallant sons and daughters who sit in them need our encouragement, nurture and support.

In spite of funding and facilitation, mechanisms to reform the police like the Internal Affairs Unit, reform remains largely cosmetic due to lack of goodwill and the failure and inability of police to "police" themselves.

There is nothing, so far, to indicate that the impunity-riddled police force operates knowing that big brother is watching.

The IPOA Act makes it an offence to disregard its recommendations.

You defy IPOA on the pain of Sh500,000 fine or a 3-year period doing time at some Kamiti or Naivasha facility. Few policemen would court such an eventually.

The ball is then with IPOA to bite the bullet and call the bluff of our rigid police force.

How else do you explain a situation where police vehicles, some emblazoned with the OCPD acronym go around collecting bribes in greater Eastlands day and night in the full know of the NIS, CID and of course the police themselves.

These things have been aired on national television, but no action has been taken. The constitution set out to "nurture and protect the well-being of the individual, family, communities and the nation," in that order.

You cannot purport to subvert the rights of an individual, let alone whole neighbourhoods and communities, in the name of safeguarding the nation.

Lest we throw the baby with the bathwater, it is not as if policemen were responsible for the tiny cells at the detention centres. They are not even to blame for the rise of Al-Shabaab.

They only failed at an operational, not socio – policy level.

The IPOA report is long on recommendations. It is not a malicious report by a body out to score cheap political points.

We all need functional security. True, the media survives on crisis, blood, and boiling politics.

But there are enough hotspots around the world to cater for that.

A people centered police force has worked in other societies. It best serves to spur police – community cooperation, the ultimate weapon in curbing crime.