By Cyrus Ombati

Nairobi, Kenya: National Police Service Commission (NPSC) will Monday meet to discuss Inspector General of Police David Kimaiyo’s move to appoint 94 police and CID county commanders.

Chairman of the commission Johnston Kavuludi said his team was not involved in the appointments. They learned about them in the media.

“We want to know how he handpicked the commanders. I will be able to comment further after we have met as a team. Recruitment into such positions should be done competitively,” he said.

Kimaiyo and his two deputies Samuel Arachi and Grace Kaindi are members of the commission.

A member of NPSC said the IG is undermining the commission and asked him to respect the law.

The official cited Section 246 of the Constitution, which says the “commission shall recruit and appoint persons to hold or act in offices in the service, confirm appointments, and determine promotions and transfers within National Police Service and exercise disciplinary, control and remove persons holding or acting in offices.” 

The commission was also to interview persons to fill vacancies in the police service taking into consideration gender, county and ethnic balancing.

But in a twist of events, Kimaiyo named the commanders and ordered them to report immediately. He is yet to name AP commanders. Kimaiyo had earlier told a meeting that he asked NPSC to establish a County Policing Authority, a command, which will include Kenya Police and Administration Police Commanding Officers and Criminal Investigations Officers in the counties.

Insecurity

It is not clear why he chose to do the appointments unilaterally, which is the prerogative of the commission.

Failure to deploy police commanders to counties has been cited as part of causes of insecurity across the country.

The appointments go against a recruitment exercise planned by the commission, which had seen posts advertised asking qualified officers to apply. The commission planned to recruit 94 commanders for both regular and Administration Police.

Kimaiyo had opposed the move by the commission saying it was against their norm in which he is the one to appoint the commanders.