Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen has outlined ways in which the government plans to restore civilians' trust in police officers.
Speaking during a joint press engagement on Wednesday evening, Murkomen revealed that the ministry was looking into several police police reforms to restore the public's trust in the force.
Firstly, he insisted on the importance of continued police training, which is currently not offered after graduation from the Kiganjo Police Training College. In these subsequent training programmes, Murkomen said that the police officers will be trained on how to foster positive relations with the masses.
Another resolution he noted was the digital occurrence book, which he said would keep police officers accountable to their superiors, not just in their station but across the country.
This accountability, he relayed, would also be achieved by his directive last month to have all police stations install CCTV cameras.
He further brought up the collaboration with the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) to install monitoring cameras on highways in order to significantly reduce the number of interactions between traffic police officers and motorists, thus reducing bribery incidents.
"This will ensure that the intervention of police officers in traffic matters will be minimal. In Nairobi, we have the Intelligence Traffic System that the county is installing in collaboration with the Korean and Chinese governments to ensure that human intervention is minimised and accountability will increase," he said.
Another incentive the CS mentioned that would improve these relations was to introduce a rewards system where police officers who perform outstandingly will be rewarded.
According to Murkomen, these recommendations are part of the police reforms being pushed out by the government to restore trust between the two entities.
However, he noted that although these reforms might help reduce graft in the institution, citizens also needed to play their own part in it, stating "it takes two to tangle".
"There is no way we will change the police system without the citizens themselves being open to changing the institution. Kenyans must say they won't pay bribes or be involved in any more graft," he said.
Recently, police officers and the public have been at loggerheads with each other, not just due to the common traffic bribery, but also the rampant cases of police brutality, forced disappearances and arbitrary apprehensions, which Kenyans blame on police officers.
