Winnie Adipo, a Kenyan woman serving in the US Air Force, still harbours scars from her previous attempts to join the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) four times.
In a candid interview published on Tuesday, July 18, by the Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, US, where she is currently based, Adipo revealed that her long-cherished dream of joining the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) was repeatedly rebuffed because of the widespread nepotism within the institution.
Despite her persistent efforts, she was turned away four times.
She revealed that unemployment was high across the country and military recruiters either offered positions to their kin or individuals willing to pay a hefty bribe.
On her fourth attempt. Adipo noted that she was asked to part with a bribe that she could not raise. She could not do it because she comes from a humble background. Her father was a high school agricultural teacher while her mother served as a nurse.
“He (the recruiter) told me, ‘Give me 200,000 shillings and I’ll fix you in.' I just didn’t have that sort of pocket money and just like that, my dream was gone," she recalled.
Adipo noted that the unsuccessful attempt was a blow to her long standing dream to serve the country since her childhood days when she visited the annual military fair in Mombasa on multiple occasions.
“When I was older, I began to understand the impacts of military service. I saw that it was something bigger than myself and I knew I wanted to join," she added.
Her dream, however, came true in 2016 when she got recruited by the United States Air Force but her journey to the top was not smooth-sailing.
In 2015, the soldier received an email approving her admission to the US Diversity Visa Program and in October of the same year, she travelled to Tacoma in Washington.
After months of struggling to get all her documentation together, Adipo, by chance, engaged in a conversation with a driver taking her for routine social security applications who shared with her the contacts of a military recruiter.
“It was so simple I couldn’t believe it. No one was trying to take my money," she gushed over how hussle-free her recruitment had been.
She joined as a health service management specialist in the medical wing of the force and climbed up the ladder to the position of staff sergeant.
KDF Recruitment
The annual recruitment of National Police Service (NPS) officers is often marred by bribery claims. Speculation has it that senior military men demand Ksh200,000 and Ksh400,000 worth of bribes to dish out cadet positions.
In March 2021, Kenyans.co.ke reported that high-ranking officials at KDF were put on the spot over allegations that they presided over massive bribery during that year's recruitment drive.
The then Vice Chief of the Defence Forces Levi Mghalu and Ex-Defence Principal Secretary Ibrahim Mohammed appeared before a Parliamentary Committee to answer to the allegations.
In July 2021, the then Defence Cabinet Secretary Monica Juma, however, dismissed bribery allegations arguing that the claims were being peddled by individuals who missed out on recruitment during the drive.
