Police reject new push to change command line

Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinnet. [Photo: File/Standard]

The police have rejected a new push to place them under the command of regional and county commissioners.

Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinnet rejected a call by Office of the President mandarins to make the police report to the county chiefs.

Sources said a meeting called and attended by all regional and county commissioners and police commanders turned stormy when OP officials led by Principal Secretary Karanja Kibicho asked the police to start reporting to the commissioners.

The meeting at the Kenya School of Adventure and Leadership in Mt Kenya was called to discuss general security ahead of next year’s General Election.

LAW IS CLEAR

“Our boss said the law is clear and they will listen to other issues other than operations of the police. The IG defended the service well and we were impressed,” said a source at the meeting.

The rejection of the push was informed by the events of the 2007 elections in which the police were blamed for most deaths that were reported.

Another source said the county commissioners had complained to OP that the police do not involve them in some operations in their areas and demanded the situation changes.

But Boinnet and other senior officers who spoke at the event rejected the call.

Others interpreted the move as an attempt to put police under the new command like that of the scrapped Provincial Administration as a way of ensuring various operations, including elections, are controlled.

Among other issues, the regional and county commissioners direct and co-ordinate all central government functions and programmes. They are known as national administration officers and are representatives of the President in their areas of jurisdiction.

They chair all security meetings and report directly to the Interior Cabinet Secretary.

Regional commissioners are in charge of a cluster of counties, in the same way provincial commissioners were in charge of provinces while county commissioners are in charge of counties and are assisted by deputy county commissioners who replaced district officers in the old order, and below them are assistant county commissioners, chiefs and assistant chiefs.

The administrators chair security committees and submit weekly reports to their superiors.

They are official government spokespersons and liaison officers in inter-governmental relations.

Regional commissioners usually mobilise resources across counties to support security operations and arbitrate conflicts across counties.