About 600,000 firearms in wrong hands, says report

Isiolo County Commissioner George Natembeya hands a gun to Peter Losu (left), a member of the Isiolo County Assembly. The MCA was given back his illegally acquired G3 rifle after he surrendered it for registration following a Government amnesty. [Photo: file/standard]

There are around 600,000 illicit arms circulating in the country, the Government has said.

The arms are mostly found among pastoralist communities in North Rift, North Eastern and Upper Eastern.

Proliferation of small arms and ammunition, the Government says, poses significant security threats as their holders use them to perpetuate conflicts.

In its Annual State of the National Security Report to Parliament, the country’s security apparatus admits that it has failed to successfully disarm the pastoralists.

The communities are pushed to acquire the arms by unending conflicts over resources, cultural aspects, porous borders and organised crimes, the report says.

“It is estimated that there are between 580,000 to 650,000 illicit arms circulating in the country, which have been used to perpetuate conflicts, thus increasingly posing significant socio-economic, political and security risks countrywide,” says the report.

The report says the illegal arms have aggravated insecurity in urban centres like Nairobi, Mombasa, Eldoret, Thika and Kisumu since they are “weapons of choice for criminals”.

Conflicts in neighbouring countries as well as weak control measures in international transfer of arms have made the weapons readily availability.

Despite the enormity of the matter, the Government is determined to deal with the problem.

criminal groups

“In an effort to address the proliferation of illicit arms, the Government has developed a draft National Policy on Small Arms and Light Weapons and the Small Arms and Light Weapons Control and Management Bill,” says the report.

The Government is further implementing the Protocol on the Prevention, Combating and Eradication of cattle rustling in Eastern Africa. It is also facilitating ratification of the Arms Trade Treaty.

But as the Government has also renewed its call to persons with illegal firearms to surrender them.

Besides illegal arms being a threat to the country’s security, the report says, the Govenment is also contending with about 40 organised criminal groups.

“Organised criminal groups still pose a challenge to the country’s national security. There is growing recognition that the intersections between organised crime and terror organisations are deepening and becoming more complex,” observes the report.