This is what you should do on security Mr President

I hope this letter finds you well Mr President. Your efforts and endeavours to transform this country into a better and more industrious nation with robust economic growth are tremendous.

Several tangible projects have been initiated under your government like the Huduma Kenya initiative and the construction of the standard gauge railway. These advancements deserve applause.

However, there’s one major challenge that is posing a huge threat to our peace, security and investor confidence - terrorism.

Kenya has in the recent past suffered unspeakable atrocities at the hands of Al Shabaab and many lives have been lost in the most brutal manner.

We have lost brilliant and idealistic young people who could have steered this country to greater heights if security had been given some serious consideration.

The responsibility of every Government is to ensure its citizens are safe.

Kenya has suffered the biggest challenge in security lapses, more than any other country in the region and this can only be attributed to police laxity and several loopholes in the security department.

There’s too much mud-smearing and politicking from the national government and the Opposition on who to blame instead of focusing on ways to strengthen and improve basic strategies that would make our country better and safer.

This blame game is plunging the country into a serious security crisis, which will in turn affect the investor confidence.

Mr President, as much as the security docket remains a prerogative of the central government, the county administration and governors should also be involved to help fight this dragon that is threatening to cripple this country.

Its time to realise that terrorism, just like any other crime, is evolving and employing advanced strategies and technologies, which highly surpass our way of collecting intelligence. Most terror attacks have found our security organs napping and it’s no wonder that even a police station can be attacked and ammunition stolen.

It has become a tradition that every financial year the Government tables a massive budget. This budgetary allocation sets aside billions of shillings for security every financial year but we are yet to see the desired results. We won’t raise eyebrows even if they allocated trillions to the security sector so long as we sleep with total peace of mind. But it’s exactly the opposite Your Excellency.

Most of these allocations set aside for security forces end up being channelled to the pockets of a few individuals. You will remember that on Labour Day, the marching band squad only received a quarter of their allowances. We’ve heard several cases of poor living conditions among the police and yet they are the people who are supposed to be vigilant and ensure our safety.

Mr President, the Government must uplift the lives of these hardworking officers who risk their lives everyday to make sure we are safe. This will boost their morale and rampant cases of corruption in the police department will drop.

Kenya must also equip herself with the latest intelligence-gathering techniques in order to tame the runaway insecurity.

Your government should also restructure and reinforce the intelligence service since most of the atrocities committed like the Garrissa University attack could have been avoided. Instead of our soldiers patrolling Somalia, they should be patrolling our borders.