Graduate Police Officers Excluded from Promotions

Police officers during a parade in December 2019.
Police officers during a parade at the Kiganjo Police Training College in December 2019.
Photo
National police Service

More than 1,000 graduate police officers graduates will not be considered for promotions this year after a directive from the National Police Service.

According to a letter from the Deputy Inspector General of Police Edward Mbugua, the officers will not be allowed to take part in this year’s promotion course at the police training college in Kiganjo.

“This is to clarify that the station commander’s course that will be mounted will comprise Sergeants and senior Sergeants only,” read part of the letter.

Undated image of National Police Service (NPS) officers at a previous parade.
Undated image of National Police Service (NPS) officers at a previous parade.
National Police Service

A number of graduates who spoke to the media anonymously voiced their concerns over the letter-terming the move as malicious.

They noted that it was an attempt to retort after a number of the officers had sued their employer.

Some of the graduates pointed out that these added on to their woes, especially after their salaries were recently slashed.

“We just had our salaries deducted, now we have been denied a chance to compete for promotion. This is not fair,” an officer spoke to the Standard.

However, NPS spokesperson Bruno Shioso affirmed that no one is being targeted in the new directive. He added that a strict procedure had to be followed during promotions in the police force.

A number of graduate police officers took their employer to court over various issues among them salaries and promotion.

The graduates had initially revealed that close to Ksh30,000 was chopped from their payslips. According to the officers, they used to earn salaries of the rank of inspectors.

The directive came from Inspector General Hilary Mutyambai- who noted that the move would bring fairness within the service.

"In view of the above order to have fairness across graduate officers of other ranks, I direct that you adjust the salaries of officers of other ranks in Job Group J to what is earned by their counterparts in respective ranks," Mutyambai directed.

This brought about complaints from the graduates as well as Kenyans online who took to social media to castigate the move. Mutyambai later on agreed to investigate and address the welfare of graduate officers.

The Inspector General of the police, Hilary Mutyambai
The Inspector General of Police Hillary Mutyambai speaking at a special seating held by the National Assembly's Committee on Education on February 26, 2021
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