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Post by kamalet on Nov 27, 2014 16:09:27 GMT 3
The current spate of insecurity has been the cause of a lot debate sometimes in very uninformed ways. We have critics ranging from ignorant media hacks to low ranking non-commissioned retired soldiers being interviewed as Homeland Security experts. The calls for the resignation of Ole Lenku and Kimaiyo clearly shows the ignorance of the people making these noises. it is plain simple - removing the two gentlemen from the scene will NOT have any impact in the security situation in Kenya. One thing that cannot be a constant is the way in which the insecurity is addressed.
For those old enough, one can claim that during the Moi regime, Kenya was a more secure country than it is today. The fact that one could have a drink at GVL (near the university) until it closes at midnight and then walked downtown to Sabina Joy to wait out the night shows how secure the city was then. You do not need to cross Uhuru Park to get mugged, you will be robbed within the city centre without waiting for it to get dark! The thuggery may be of the petty type, but we also face bigger problems due to terrorism that we have to deal with. How some mad men decide to attempt a raid on an Army Barracks suggests how low we have fallen in the management of security. Moi's system was simple - take away human rights and the problem manages itself! The Special Branch (today's NIS) had a lot more power that include arrest which our 21st century sleuths cannot. If need be, they would water-board you, torture you for plotting crimes against the state. Unfortunately the zeal to weed the country of criminals against the state got extended to political crimes against the ruling party!! It is in this latter part of the fight against crime that the likes of Jukwaa's Onyango Oloo find themselves!
When people fought for the new constitution, one key element of the activist world was the enshrinement of the Bill of Rights in the constitution that was inviolable and which could not be amended without a referendum. The bill of rights was drawn up in a manner that ensured the atrocities of the Moi government would never happen again. With the Bill of Rights so many changes were made to the security apparatus that weakened their overall capability with power being transferred from the executive to the legislature in how these institutions worked.The head of police is now appointed via parliament and has security of tenure with parliament only being the final authority in his removal. We took away the power of arrest from the Intelligence staff leaving the outfit that is a key cog of national security with the enviable role of making advisory reports that can or cannot be followed up! Knowing that a crime is about to be committed and preventing it is the first step in fighting crime. But if the person who becomes aware of this cannot act but has to file a report with someone else and that someone else cannot be ordered around by anyone due to constitutional independence creates the perfect recipe for anarchy!
Guys - Kimaiyo is going no where.....!
So I thought I would take a look at the US Patriot Act that was loved by the Republicans and hated by the Democrats who would do nothing to have it not die in December 2005 when it was supposed to die a natural death. The Patriot Act was declared by the Democrats as an affront to the US Bill of Rights but it was still allowed to pass and very many atrocities were committed in the name of the Act. Personal liberties were taken away and all that security operative had to do was claim that they were acting in accordance with the Act and your rights immediately disappeared.
So is time for Kenya to consider enacting a similar law to the Patriot Act to stem the security situation that we currently are moaning about? Is the deprivation of some rights for the better good of the society at large desirable? At a personal level, I do not think the present state of our laws allows us to deal with the security challenges we are facing. How do we allow people charged with terrorism related crimes bail and still hope that we can stop terror in Kenya? There is of course those whose first instinct will be to insist on their rights and those of criminals remaining intact and will argue against such a law. But i would venture to ask why anyone who has no criminal intentions would resist such legislation? We must give the government the opportunity to do what is right for Kenyans on matters security, but there should be provision to ensure the law is not abused with sufficient reparations for anyone wrongly deprived of their rights through illegal action by government agents and punishment for anyone that abused this law.
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Post by Daktari wa makazi on Nov 27, 2014 18:26:47 GMT 3
Interesting, I expected arguments of this nature from you! I find your catapulting of significant issues skewed when you come here and praise Moi. He was a dictator who used brutal force to dehumanize people to a level akin to depravity and nothing of substances came from him. We see littered amongst us his legacy where history is judging him harshly even before his death.
Equally, why would you declare Kimaiyo is not going anywhere soon? If he is incompetent and from the insecurity we see daily, he surely is, why would he not go? Aah, I see because he is a muthee appointed by the kapresident.
Human rights which you denigrate have made Kenya today a country to envy in Africa. We stand tall because we respect the integrity of people, albeit on paper in our constitution. Anything which negates that surely will set us backward.
You suggest we introduce a Patriot Act like the U.S. law passed in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The US Patriot Act’s goals were to strengthen domestic security and broaden the powers of law-enforcement agencies with regards to identifying and stopping terrorists. It is good thing if it will work in our situation, but the question, will it?
We have plethora of laws which are able to stop criminality but the problem has been implementing it.
• No laws will solve problems like porous borders where anyone with money can pass through. • No law will stop the policemen from joining criminals in criminality. • No laws will stop corrupt officials from selling documents to dubious foreigners.
The change we need is a root and branch one to the way things are done, not some knee-jerk reactions. I say start by removing the top.
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Post by kamalet on Nov 27, 2014 18:56:48 GMT 3
Now I stand accused of praising Moi!! It is a FACT that Kenya had fewer security issues then than they do today. It is a FACT that Moi being a despot was probably more responsible for the state of security then. So yes we do have a constant that we can point a finger at...MOI. It is a FACT that human rights are respected BY THE GOVERNMENT today than they were during Moi's time and that is thanks to the constitution! I would hardly imagine these are points anyone wants to argue with!
So Kimaiyo who is a creation of the new constitution and who was appointed by the last regime will sit pretty until he goes mad and contemplates resignation. Parliament will not sack him due to tribal affiliations and general incompetence!
The solution then must lie in changing tactic! We have problems in the country that need attention with a sledge hammer as the US did with the Patriot Act in response to 9/11. The deaths in Kapedo and Mandera should be sufficient to kick start the process of a draconian law that deals with the problem.
It is not enough to shout at government all call for heads to roll if there is nothing new one is offering in the form of a solution. Burying our heads in the sand because we have porous borders that anyone can cross or corrupt policemen being there is not the solution. How do you deal with these problems without knee jerk reactions? The top is not where the problem resides....and neither is removing it the solution!
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Post by podp on Nov 28, 2014 22:12:31 GMT 3
Guys - Kimaiyo is going no where.....!So I thought I would take a look at the US Patriot Act that was loved by the Republicans and hated by the Democrats who would do nothing to have it not die in December 2005 when it was supposed to die a natural death. The Patriot Act was declared by the Democrats as an affront to the US Bill of Rights but it was still allowed to pass and very many atrocities were committed in the name of the Act. Personal liberties were taken away and all that security operative had to do was claim that they were acting in accordance with the Act and your rights immediately disappeared. So is time for Kenya to consider enacting a similar law to the Patriot Act to stem the security situation that we currently are moaning about? Is the deprivation of some rights for the better good of the society at large desirable? At a personal level, I do not think the present state of our laws allows us to deal with the security challenges we are facing. How do we allow people charged with terrorism related crimes bail and still hope that we can stop terror in Kenya? There is of course those whose first instinct will be to insist on their rights and those of criminals remaining intact and will argue against such a law. But i would venture to ask why anyone who has no criminal intentions would resist such legislation? We must give the government the opportunity to do what is right for Kenyans on matters security, but there should be provision to ensure the law is not abused with sufficient reparations for anyone wrongly deprived of their rights through illegal action by government agents and punishment for anyone that abused this law. 1st red light very true. Jubilee deal is 50:50 between TNA and URP. IG belongs to URP so asking TNA to get rid of him will not fly. as for Cord and other TNA or outliers they can shout themselves hoarse 'until the cows come back' but IG will stay. if you wish him out talk to URP. as for CS ole doorman from 2nd rate hotel ole Metito is the guy to talk to for replacement. 2nd red high light The bill also fails to amend other portions of the Patriot Act in dire need of reform, most notably those relating to the issuance and use of national security letters (NSLs). NSLs permit the government to obtain the communication, financial and credit records of anyone deemed relevant to a terrorism investigation even if that person is not suspected of unlawful behavior. Numerous Department of Justice Inspector General reports have confirmed that tens of thousands of these letters are issued every year and they are used to collect information on people two and three times removed from a terrorism suspect. NSLs also come with a nondisclosure requirement that precludes a court from determining whether the gag is necessary to protect national security. www.aclu.org/reform-patriot-actthis may fly with the tyranny of numbers game but like most other very good laws we have the crunch will come at implementation. our patriotism is on our ethnicities not the entity called Kenya. so if devolution took root and security was each County's business you can bet other than cross border cattle rustling or land issues, no terrorism will fly. in Mandera the County Commissioner and other National Government of Kenya workers will continue sabotaging efforts to ensure security and other accompanying developments. best way forward is... Unlike the case at the moment, the county and national governments must work in tandem to protect the Mandera road and fortify border security. The national government must relax its artificial monopoly and allow the Mandera government a role in security, a strategy that should also increasingly apply in all counties nationwide. - See more at: www.the-star.co.ke/news/both-governments-need-secure-mandera#sthash.xVL7KqUt.dpuf
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Post by podp on Nov 28, 2014 22:38:41 GMT 3
Interesting, I expected arguments of this nature from you! I find your catapulting of significant issues skewed when you come here and praise Moi. We have plethora of laws which are able to stop criminality but the problem has been implementing it. • No laws will solve problems like porous borders where anyone with money can pass through. • No law will stop the policemen from joining criminals in criminality. • No laws will stop corrupt officials from selling documents to dubious foreigners.The change we need is a root and branch one to the way things are done, not some knee-jerk reactions. I say start by removing the top. The Government backed by the US, UK and Israel has consistently failed to craft a coherent, sensible and workable policy. These so-called allies have fallen for the false line of thinking that assumes that throwing money and equipment at the institutions that should be dealing with security matters is the panacea. Take the case of the Anti-Terrorism Police Unit. This is a highly discredited organisation that is not only corrupt, but is also responsible for gross human rights abuses, including enforced disappearances and extra-judicial executions. Read more at: www.standardmedia.co.ke/?articleID=2000142588&story_title=Kenya-police-reforms-key-to-war-on-terror“The ATPU is treated as being immune to any accountability and they know this. They’ve been given the green light to do what they what. They aren’t held accountable by the executive of course, or the judiciary. They have never ever been held accountable." www.opensocietyfoundations.org/sites/default/files/tired-taking-you-court-11-19-2013.pdfthe saddest of the 3 bullet points is the 3rd one. in Uganda and Ethiopia, although less well off in comparison to us, patriotism makes much fewer of their police, immigration upto the President sell citizenship to dubious citizens. the late Senator who was buried today set the standard by accepting half a million Kenya shillings to sell citizenship to all, be they Indians, Somalis, Pakistanis, Eastern Europeans etc. how could a guy who could not maintain 1 wife all of a sudden have a multitude www.nation.co.ke/oped/Cartoon/-/454986/454986/-/156q6i6z/-/index.html(scroll until you find the one 4 ladies are fighting for the Subari legacy of a dead guy whose buddies are eulogizing his rich legacy)
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Post by jakaswanga on Nov 29, 2014 9:49:25 GMT 3
Kamalet, Good morning sir, Consider this strange one also, during the Moi days, all graduates would be guaranteed employment; and there was something called boom. Today, something happened, first-class masters are crying in the sun after failing to make it to NYS or police recruitment; even nurses tarmac after completing training despite a health-care crisis; college students are rioting left and right because of tuition and other levies, and, wretchedly, they are living in mabati structures near slums, without electricity! Something obviously happened and change came to the republic! Good to evaluate other dynamics that determine security or insecurity; and why nowadays, one gets mugged daytime at Uhuru park; or tight-clad women get stripped in Githurai or Kayole stages in broad daylight; not to mention Kapedo, Baragoi, Tana Delta, and Westgate fiascos. jukwaa.proboards.com/thread/9222/why-al-shabbab-butchering-christians --omundustrong. May be the Wagalla Massacre –-cheekily posted by Otishotishas an example of tough law and order in the Omundustrong thread, pacified the NFD (nothern frontier district) for two decades! And the recent ''massacre of 149'' Al-Shababs (that is a whole company!) much trumped by caretaker Sheriff William, will bring much relief in the afflicted area. OF PATRIOT ACTS, OF ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL CRISIS When it comes to an internal political problem touching on security and terrorism, Patriot acts do not impress me. I remember Kenya, 1950-1960 or thereabouts, had one of the biggest terrorist problems known to the powers that were in that period. It was dubbed Mau Mau. And the narrative was, these natives were a particularly bestial gang of bang-smoking Gikuyus, who sucked human blood and cut bodies to pieces using blunt machetes. PROBABLY sponsored and infested by communist agitators!I will review Robert Ruark's Uhuru for some of you. This book was the standard artistic rendition of (Kenya's) settler colonial ideology and its understanding of the Mau Mau. --I will have a historical parallel as you will see below. How uncannilythe neocolonial Kenya's intellectual understanding of Al-Shabab, mirrors the settler colinial narrative of Mau Mau. The Kenyan Army is currently in Somali, and by some accounts, doing roaring business in ports like Kismayo. That is your occupation army right there. And it shall antagonise nationalist sensibilities. But in our colonial, settler-like self-righteousness, we of course see ourselves as a force of civilisation in Somalia. We are bringing stability and Christian goodies to the primitive Allah-infested, miraa-chewing goats of that godforsaken land; and they should be five times daily on their knees entreating KENYA AKHBAR! --thankless goats! don't they see kenya is a citadel of prosperity of enlightenment! mavi ya kuku muslims! Well, Somali nationalism has news for us and our shining army of lootenants! Just like Kenyan nationalism had some news for the civilising, Christian colonial regime of the British which, on a closer look, was nothing but an enslaving land-grabbing enterprise! Now, fellow Kenyans: You saw in Kapedo, in Baringo, how the conquering General Karangi and his commando boys go to work. Forget Westgate for the moment. They just opened fire on grazing cows and executed 72 in one field! BTW these executions of livestock have since been confirmed. Now, that is your heroic Christian army on OWN CITIZENS. Imagine what they do outside the media limelight, on terrorist sympathising communities across! You get a blowback, like Christians being selected for execution on highway bush ambush. It is called tit-for-tat. And like the British colonial press of the 50s writing editorials on the Kenyan emergency denouncing the Mau Mau atrocities, we bloggers can wax righteous condemning Islamic barbarism and Muslim psychopathology!Patriot laws what your Christian army has been throwing tear-gas in Mosques and opening fire in the same –-like the Great Egyptian army destroying an elected Islamic brotherhood? Kamalet, that is what I call political bankruptcy. The USA has the advantage of a power able to export her contradictions and fight its terrorist wars on other peoples soil, far from the homeland. Countries who are tough on terror which is their own homegrown problem, like Israel, however brilliant a security apparatus they have, however Draconian their laws be, and empowered their security services, are nothing but giants slowly suffocating inside their cages of armour.What are the real causes of insecurity in Kenya? –-Forgetting Somalis and Pwani-si-Kenya Muslims for the moment? It is the collapse of once thriving pastoral and peasant agro-communities, but without a replacement to absorb the smashed lives. It is a grassroots economic crisis. –--Remember before this Mandera massacre, there have been inter-Somali clan spree of killings on account of economic competition for scarce resources. Tana delta too –-after land was allocated to foreign farmers and once rich grazing grounds blocked. Baringo Pokot too, where sustained droughts decimating livestock, combined with squeezed lands that do not allow for natural replenishing of stock, leads to RUSTLING as quick method of credit. (the way banks use high interest rates to parasitically (rofl)rustle your accounts! Ripping businesses/individuals to the bone!) Here is Onyango Oloo, earlier on, in the aftermath of Mpeketoni, attempting to launch a serious think about Security Kenya. (I consider your patriot law proposal a subset of that general heading). jukwaa.proboards.com/thread/9073/seriously-security
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Post by kamalet on Nov 29, 2014 9:54:33 GMT 3
the saddest of the 3 bullet points is the 3rd one. in Uganda and Ethiopia, although less well off in comparison to us, patriotism makes much fewer of their police, immigration upto the President sell citizenship to dubious citizens. the late Senator who was buried today set the standard by accepting half a million Kenya shillings to sell citizenship to all, be they Indians, Somalis, Pakistanis, Eastern Europeans etc. how could a guy who could not maintain 1 wife all of a sudden have a multitude Actually the situations in Uganda and Ethiopia are very different from Kenya's. I can assure you that the issue is not just "patriotism" as you are calling it. They have laws that have teeth and in both countries, their respect for the human rights of terrorists is NIL. In Kenya we treat terror suspects no different to shop lifters and jay walkers. We will routinely give them bail to return and exact revenge on the officers that arrested them and then disappear jumping bail altogether! It is true that following the world cup bombings in Kampala, the ATPU saw the opportunity of 'getting rid of its own terror suspects' by claiming they were linked to the Uganda bombings and promptly shipping them to Uganda. These Kenyans are still in prison in Uganda if you recall and the one that got away was Al Amin Kimathi who had been arrested for the same reason after several months in custody. It is not any different in Ethiopia! Kenya and its laws contribute to insecurity through the liberal guarantee of rights to criminals....hence my suggestion of enacting the Patriot Act in Kenya!
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Post by b6k on Nov 29, 2014 11:11:01 GMT 3
Actually the situations in Uganda and Ethiopia are very different from Kenya's. I can assure you that the issue is not just "patriotism" as you are calling it. They have laws that have teeth and in both countries, their respect for the human rights of terrorists is NIL. In Kenya we treat terror suspects no different to shop lifters and jay walkers. We will routinely give them bail to return and exact revenge on the officers that arrested them and then disappear jumping bail altogether! It is true that following the world cup bombings in Kampala, the ATPU saw the opportunity of 'getting rid of its own terror suspects' by claiming they were linked to the Uganda bombings and promptly shipping them to Uganda. These Kenyans are still in prison in Uganda if you recall and the one that got away was Al Amin Kimathi who had been arrested for the same reason after several months in custody. It is not any different in Ethiopia! Kenya and its laws contribute to insecurity through the liberal guarantee of rights to criminals....hence my suggestion of enacting the Patriot Act in Kenya! Kamale, Ethiopia & Uganda also happen to be dictatorships whose respect for the rights of their own citizens is almost Nil. We'd have to roll back a number of democratic gains we have made to mirror their tactics. The fact that you celebrate the flushing of suspected terrorists to UG just like Fidel Castro flushed his criminals from their prisons in Cuba to Florida isn't an act that should be celebrated. In fact it should be condemned & investigated by the DPP. Unlike Ethiopia or Uganda we have a free media which never shies to report on our shortcomings. Ethiopia, unlike Kenya, even has a devolved security system with regional security teams made up of locals that police their areas, not the blundering centralized national police force we are clinging on to even when it's clearly not working. If the Kenya police can't work within the laws that we have it's not that we need to add new laws, or scale back civil rights to accommodate their incompetence, but that they need to up their game & ensure that when they do produce criminals or terrorists before a court they have done their homework well enough to make the charges against them stick. Having had my share of dealings with police prosecutors (as a complainant & I should add) I am not surprised they rarely succeed in court. They are as clueless as the Kimaiyo who you tell us is going nowhere. We really need to rethink whether it's wise having D- types handling our security simply because they can take orders from above or whether we want folks who can think outside the box, anticipate attacks, & plan appropriate countermeasures BEFORE we are hit. A police force whose work is only to dispatch antiquated Land Rovers to pick up dead civilians really doesn't do us much good. The day we can have law enforcement that is for the people and not for the state apparatus is when we'll start making headway.
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Post by kamalet on Nov 29, 2014 11:56:24 GMT 3
B6k
The question to ask in comparison to say the US - as bad as the Patriot Act was bad with regards to violation of the bill of rights, did it help the US security agencies in addressing the problem of terror? I think it did. Some of the provisions in the Act robbed Americans the right to something like bail or immediate access to a lawyer.The argument of many was that if you are innocent then you need not fear the draconian law and only criminals should be worried about it.
You talk about reversing gains we made over the years on the matter of rights. You need to also appreciate that these rights have come at a price and that is unfortunately what we are reaping today! Why deny a terror suspect or a murderer bail whilst the constitution provides a guarantee to bail? The police ill-equiped as they are have quite some talent and I know several ATPU officers who have had the best training in US, UK and even in Israel. They can follow and get you a terror suspect and will take the guy to court and from there they lose their terrorist to the judiciary who will "rightfully" give bond to the accused! Inevitably these guys will either rendition the terror suspect or extra-judicially sort out the suspect. But the Kenyan himself does not help at all. Lenku championed Nyumba Kumiand we laughed. So when those idiots thought that rain water and ash would protect them and attempted to raid a military facility in Mombasa, they got their just medicine. Perhaps even more curious was the failure of relatives to go claim the bodies of those killed to protect themselves from the police!
Uganda and Ethiopia may be your perfect dictatorships, but their citizens are not being made to kneel down and get their heads chopped off! Perhaps it is a despotic government or law that we need to save us from ourselves!I am no criminal and am peace loving - but whenever I think of those Kenyans massacred in Mandera, I see no wrong in the criminals who did this being denied their human rights and I would happily the function where they are quartered!
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Post by b6k on Nov 29, 2014 17:59:04 GMT 3
Kamale, I would be wary to compare the US, a democracy with almost a 240 year history with a country like ours that's barely just passed 50 years & is only 4 years into making baby steps with a decent, if copy-pasted, constitution. Where the US has had a constitutional history of adding on to freedoms or better defining them as they go along, we have had a history of whittling away at whatever noble intentions we start with. Truth be told the US PATRIOT Act is a stain on US democracy. Whether it really did add much value in the war against terror or simply act as a means by the elite to water down the rights of citizenry is something we could argue about for threads on end. As for the Nyumba Kumi initiative, I don’t see how adopting an overtly communist & outmoded system will help since it raises more questions as to how it will be administered (will the Wajumbe, or heads of the 10 households, be paid civil servants?) when there are simpler ways of monitoring people using technology, or in rural areas, older ways already exist such as clan systems headed by Wazee wa vijiji. Within your reply you made it clear that your friends at the ATPU already have means of working around the rotating doors at the judiciary when you said: Inevitably these guys will either rendition the terror suspect or extra-judicially sort out the suspect. So if they can already rendition (flush to another country) or neutralize suspects via extra-judicial killings (EJK) without answering to anyone, why do we need a new law? Think about it. They already have carte blanche to go as far as snuffing out a human life without any of them being brought to book or being charged in a court of law. Seems to me they can simply keep on reditioning & dishing out the EJK medicine until the day you start seeing ATPU agents being arrested for breaking laws.
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Post by kamalet on Nov 29, 2014 18:19:28 GMT 3
Kamale, I would be wary to compare the US, a democracy with almost a 240 year history with a country like ours that's barely just passed 50 years & is only 4 years into making baby steps with a decent, if copy-pasted, constitution. Where the US has had a constitutional history of adding on to freedoms or better defining them as they go along, we have had a history of whittling away at whatever noble intentions we start with. Truth be told the US PATRIOT Act is a stain on US democracy. Whether it really did add much value in the war against terror or simply act as a means by the elite to water down the rights of citizenry is something we could argue about for threads on end. As for the Nyumba Kumi initiative, I don’t see how adopting an overtly communist & outmoded system will help since it raises more questions as to how it will be administered (will the Wajumbe, or heads of the 10 households, be paid civil servants?) when there are simpler ways of monitoring people using technology, or in rural areas, older ways already exist such as clan systems headed by Wazee wa vijiji. Within your reply you made it clear that your friends at the ATPU already have means of working around the rotating doors at the judiciary when you said: Inevitably these guys will either rendition the terror suspect or extra-judicially sort out the suspect. So if they can already rendition (flush to another country) or neutralize suspects via extra-judicial killings (EJK) without answering to anyone, why do we need a new law? Think about it. They already have carte blanche to go as far as snuffing out a human life without any of them being brought to book or being charged in a court of law. Seems to me they can simply keep on reditioning & dishing out the EJK medicine until the day you start seeing ATPU agents being arrested for breaking laws. I can see how effortless it was for you to twist my words!! Carte Blanche..? So if Kenya is a toddler democracy, then it has no business trying to work with a 200 year old brain! But putting all this aside and noting that you disagree with me on my proposed solution to the current insecurity, it would serve the debate better if you disagreed and provided an alternative solution to the current mess we are in. I think we have too many arm chair critics who offer no alternative solution! Be part of the solution!
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Post by b6k on Nov 29, 2014 19:41:18 GMT 3
Kamale, did I really twist your words or simply emphasize that since your friends at ATPU have the "inevitable" fallback plan of (1) renditions or (2) EJK as a final solution, to argue that their hands are tied because of lack of a law with teeth is moot. They can & often resort to being cop, judge, jury, AND executioner. So if it ain't broke, why fix it? As for solutions, haven't I alluded to some in previous posts? If you go to war with a neighboring country (or factions therein) isn't it prudent to remove a second layer of defence from their barracks & deploy them strategically in Somalia facing outposts on the Kenya side of the border? Wouldn't it make sense to have border patrols carried out by the same forces? Isn't it prudent for the CiC to demand that all AMISOM sectors that touch the Kenyan border should be policed by the KDF & not other African states with forces in Somalia? If a directive banning night travel could be passed by the transport minister when buses were killing folks wantonly in road accidents, couldn't a similar ban on night travel from Mandera & other insurgency prone areas have been in place? Shouldn't the old "convoy" system of travel that mitigated against bandits been initiated? Wait a minute. What the heck am I doing? Don't we pay Kimaiyo, Ole Lenku, & the always forgotten Rachel Omamo & Kameru hefty salaries to come up with solutions so we can safely rest in our armchairs? Didn't Ole Lenku go to Israel for "training" just days before the Mandera massacre ON OUR DIME? What did he learn while he was there or is he going to propose we build a Jerusalem style wall? We rely on the state to protect us because at the end of the day they have our billions (where do they go?) to ensure they have the right staffing, planning & equipment to get the job done. Earlier this week the UK released information they have foiled 5 terror attacks this year: www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article4076265.htmlWhen will we ever get such detailed information save for the actual attacks that end up making headlines? How long will we have to rely on the likes of Jicho Pevu to do what our spooks are employed to do, infiltrate those networks & get to know how they recruit their squads. Do we even have an idea of how many Kenyans have crossed over to Somalia to join Al Shabaab? All governments at some point end up having the odd sacking or at the very least a reshuffle. If Ole Lenku can't be sacked then surely he can be moved to a ministry more in line with what he did all his life like tourism. If Anne Waiguru of Devolution is the only performing CS to the point that she is now policing stripping in addition to Kibera clean up duties then by all means have her cover the security dockets as well.
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Post by OtishOtish on Nov 29, 2014 20:03:16 GMT 3
As for solutions, haven't I alluded to some in previous posts? If you go to war with a neighboring country (or factions therein) isn't it prudent to remove a second layer of defence from their barracks & deploy them strategically in Somalia facing outposts on the Kenya side of the border? I too have been wondering about this idea that the security of Kenya has now been outsourced to Ethiopians etc. Indeed. It is always amusing when people pay taxes that are used to pay others to do a job and are themselves then asked to provide solutions! State House itself has just come out and stated that corruption (in the police etc.) is a huge part of the problem. And abuses by police and KDF---Mt. Elgon, Wagalla, Dasani Westgate, artillery on cattle---also indicate other problems. If I were to think of solutions, it would not be " in that case, let's increase their powers!" In the context, ideas like nyumba kumi are downright bizarre. Citizen Wanjiku "discovers" plot, and then what is she supposed to do? Report to the police that the president himself has (through representatives) said is thoroughly rotten? The ones who, according to State House, will happily eat chicken to let criminals get away with it.
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Post by b6k on Nov 30, 2014 6:49:04 GMT 3
Otishotish, Nyumba Kumi is as dead as the dodo. I see little value in KE embracing a system which no longer is effective even in TZ. Who would sieve through all the data collected by the heads of the 10 households & determine who should be investigated further as a threat to the public good? Considering Nairobi alone has a population of over 3,000,000 the number of reports generated (would they be weekly or monthly?) would run into hundreds of thousands at a time!
Before we encourage citizens to police one another because the Kenya Police have failed why not use other existing administrative offices to monitor people? What, pray tell, is the work of a Chief in an urban setting? I once had to get a letter from a Chief here in Nairobi (place of residence) & was struck by the thought that the post really is as close to obsolete as one can get as he doesn't know me from Adam, at least when compared to the Chief in my Nyalgunga in the Highlands (place of origin) who can have a pretty good idea by cross referencing me as son of so & so from this or that clan, etc.
Over the years KE has excelled in coming up with private solutions for public problems. When the public transport system failed to meet public demand, the Matatu industry was born. When public schools failed to meet our expectations we saw the mushrooming of private schools. When the Kenya Police failed to keep us secure we saw not only the rise of private security firms (toothless as they are without firearms) but the advent of exclusive gated communities which are growing to such an extent that someday the well to do amongst us may spend most of their lives in the larger ones without having to leave as all amenities will be available within the safety of their walls. Concurrently in the more desperate neighborhoods & rural areas we saw the rise of lynching of suspected criminals & organized vigilante groups to deal with crime & insecurity.
Yesterday I saw a soundbite from CID head, Muhoro parroting his boss that we need to be vigilant & police ourselves. So it seems pretty clear that some form of community policing will be touted as the silver bullet to keep us safe. Try as we might, the one thing we cannot do is come up with our own private KDF. I find it scandalous that the President has opted to remain mute on the Mandera massacre & maintain that the buck stops with us even when faced with Al Shabaab...
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Post by podp on Nov 30, 2014 9:07:49 GMT 3
[Actually the situations in Uganda and Ethiopia are very different from Kenya's. I can assure you that the issue is not just "patriotism" as you are calling it. They have laws that have teeth and in both countries, their respect for the human rights of terrorists is NIL. In Kenya we treat terror suspects no different to shop lifters and jay walkers. We will routinely give them bail to return and exact revenge on the officers that arrested them and then disappear jumping bail altogether! It is true that following the world cup bombings in Kampala, the ATPU saw the opportunity of 'getting rid of its own terror suspects' by claiming they were linked to the Uganda bombings and promptly shipping them to Uganda. These Kenyans are still in prison in Uganda if you recall and the one that got away was Al Amin Kimathi who had been arrested for the same reason after several months in custody. It is not any different in Ethiopia! Kenya and its laws contribute to insecurity through the liberal guarantee of rights to criminals....hence my suggestion of enacting the Patriot Act in Kenya! we also have very good laws on paper. what we have too is double speak This week, military courts at the Mtongwe Naval Base in Mombasa stepped action against soldiers accused of deserting their military posts in wartime by sentencing eight to life imprisonment, sparking fear and anxiety among 18 detained former conscripts facing similar charges. Twenty-five former servicemen and an officer who left the military in 2007 and 2008 were detained at the Mtongwe naval base when they went to seek clearance documents earlier this year. The soldiers say they lawfully resigned in 2007 and 2008 to work for US security firms in Kuwait, Afghanistan and Iraq, but the military claims they were deserters. Read more at: www.standardmedia.co.ke/thecounties/article/2000142973/anxiety-as-military-courts-condemn-nine-soldiers-to-life-imprisonmentin Uganda one is caught committing robbery while armed they treat one as an army man who 'deserted' and hence one appears before a court martial. contrast here in our beloved country drug lords like the Akasha's are protected by the IG which implies the Deputy PORK has shares and the deputy IG roping in PORK. The third most iconic insecurity event of the week that added to the atmosphere of mounting dread even among the ruling coalition’s most ardent supporters was the disappearance of top cop Okonya, reportedly after two consecutive altercations the same morning, first with Deputy Inspector General of Police Grace Grace Kaindi and then Inspector General of Police David Kimaiyo. Okonya was apparently objecting to finding the lock on his office at Vigilance House, Police Headquarters, changed and the space allocated to another officer when he stormed out of the IG’s offices at Jogoo House and drove straight to the US Embassy in the diplomatic district of Muthaiga. Thereafter he vanished and all his digital communications have been offline. There was panic and turmoil among top police officers at Okonya’s disappearance and no comment whatever from the US Embassy. Media and diplomatic sources speculated that Okonya, one of the top investigators of the 2007-08 post-election violence, may be a prospective ICC witness on the side of the floundering prosecution. In underworld circles, however, it was rumoured that his disappearance had more to do with the ongoing extradition to the US of the Akasha brothers and two others on international drug-smuggling charges than his famed detailed dossiers on the PEV, which he long ago shared with other top cops.Whatever the truth about Okonya’s disappearance, the government has mishandled the issue completely in terms of PR and information. The petrified silence from both Vigilance House and Jogoo House speaks inscrutable volumes. Failures of security have clearly been compounded by failures to keep the official narrative uninterrupted, credible, transparent and persuasive. A situation whereby both security and communications strategies have gone haywire does not generate public confidence. It constitutes a national security crisis of proportions that can only invite the most unforeseen backlashes. - See more at: www.the-star.co.ke/news/kenya-falls-security-crisis#sthash.W0KLcxbb.dpufwe rent seek everywhere we are. in Madd Madd World cartoon on Saturday yesterday in Kenya two cops at the border are drawn taking bribes allowing heavily armed al Shabaab fighters into Kenya. that is us. our laws are present but whenever one is posted the mantra is you eat at your work place hence the mentality that one uses ones post to seek rent. look at this confession. He said the PS’s appealed to former President Kibaki and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga for government help as they joined friends to raise funds. He said the appeal was “positive”. “The international lawyers are extremely expensive but at the end of the day you feel they have earned their money. They do their work well and without them you find yourself with pro-bono lawyers and before you know it you are in a lot of problems,” he said. Muthaura paid special tribute to his childhood friend Silas Kobia, his daughter Susan and Koome Kobia, who ran the fundraising accounts. By the time the case was over, a surplus of Sh80 million lay idle in the account. Muthaura said he first suggested that the money be refunded to the people who donated it before the foundation idea came up. www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000142984/muthaura-i-spent-sh30-million-a-month-on-icc-casetherein lies the solution to our bro bono lawyers, underpaid cops, etc......just curious where could a civil servant on earth, except Kenya, afford to spend kshs. 30 M per month without rent seeking ventures? a Patriot Act will just be an avenue for more rent seeking ventures to this kind
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Post by podp on Nov 30, 2014 10:01:58 GMT 3
Otishotish, Nyumba Kumi is as dead as the dodo. I see little value in KE embracing a system which no longer is effective even in TZ. Who would sieve through all the data collected by the heads of the 10 households & determine who should be investigated further as a threat to the public good? Considering Nairobi alone has a population of over 3,000,000 the number of reports generated (would they be weekly or monthly?) would run into hundreds of thousands at a time! Before we encourage citizens to police one another because the Kenya Police have failed why not use other existing administrative offices to monitor people? What, pray tell, is the work of a Chief in an urban setting? I once had to get a letter from a Chief here in Nairobi (place of residence) & was struck by the thought that the post really is as close to obsolete as one can get as he doesn't know me from Adam, at least when compared to the Chief in my Nyalgunga in the Highlands (place of origin) who can have a pretty good idea by cross referencing me as son of so & so from this or that clan, etc.Over the years KE has excelled in coming up with private solutions for public problems. When the public transport system failed to meet public demand, the Matatu industry was born. When public schools failed to meet our expectations we saw the mushrooming of private schools. When the Kenya Police failed to keep us secure we saw not only the rise of private security firms (toothless as they are without firearms) but the advent of exclusive gated communities which are growing to such an extent that someday the well to do amongst us may spend most of their lives in the larger ones without having to leave as all amenities will be available within the safety of their walls. Concurrently in the more desperate neighborhoods & rural areas we saw the rise of lynching of suspected criminals & organized vigilante groups to deal with crime & insecurity. Yesterday I saw a soundbite from CID head, Muhoro parroting his boss that we need to be vigilant & police ourselves. So it seems pretty clear that some form of community policing will be touted as the silver bullet to keep us safe. Try as we might, the one thing we cannot do is come up with our own private KDF. I find it scandalous that the President has opted to remain mute on the Mandera massacre & maintain that the buck stops with us even when faced with Al Shabaab... 1st red high light in most police states, in Europe I have Germany, Austria and Switzerland while in most Arab countries in Egypt, Saudia, etc. ones local chief is very important. in Austria and USA for example outside cities they have locals as policemen such that functions like passports issuance are devolved. since one was born in a village, registered there when one reaches of age (18) the local records office issues an ID and passport (if needed) not like us in Kenya where we continue to close down regional offices that were issuing passports (introduced less than 3 years ago) in favor of central (Nairobi) so that other Kajwangs can in a short span own houses in Runda and build churches and mosques in their birth places as personal houses. 2nd red high light it is greedy Kenyatta senior who had grown in poverty and when when he become the first PORK his first order of business was to amass wealth, surround himself with security and lord over all and soundly in the space called Kenya. one 'smart' way was to kill the railway so that matatus, trailers and other personally owned means of transport triumphed over public transport so that him and those close could enrich themselves. Moi continues in those footsteps while Kibaki tried to show us in Vision 2030 that to prosper as a people (mark you this was after PEV in 2007/8) that we need to build our railway, public transport etc. Uhuru is torn between realizing efficient public transport and keeping deputy PORK (he has a voracious appetite as he seeks to catch up behind Kenyatta, Moi, Kibaki, etc. families on matters wealth hence his chief honchos aka IG, ChirChirs, etc must seek rent ) close by for support in 2017 the private schools idea is to return us to the pre independence days when only children of home guards were inducted into the system so as to perpetuate the colonial system. hence the Njonjos of today can be nurtured by excluding the children of the holoi polo from ascending to universities The impact on household expenditure. Kenyan families sacrifice so much for higher education and on analysis contribute more than the government in funding this public good. The cost is an issue. Funding higher education has emerged as one of the biggest concerns in Kenya, with the surge in student numbers. Government subsidies are no longer enough and universities are going into commercial activities. www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20130919150021262as for gated communities we are just reverting back to burying our heads in the sand like the 1st aristocrats who came to Kenya when our territory was first run by Imperial British East Africa (IBEA) as elaborated in Ndegwa's book Walking in Kenyatta Struggles, My Story, first published in 2006, that explains the zoning off parts of today Nairobi, Central and Rift Valley provinces as exclusively for European settlers resulting in violent relations between those in and those out “the violence that was part of the imperial baggage was not just motivated by the need to take away what rightfully belonged to the African. Colonial violence and dispossession were themselves products of a racial superiority complex. The white man behaved as if – and indeed believed – that the superiority he exhibited was divinely sanctioned.” So, the more land the Africans lost, the more the European settlement and the Empire in general expanded. “This turn of events served the settler perfectly, in the sense that the source of supply of labour in European farms was assured,” Ndegwa recounts. “This, in the eyes of the settler, unfortunately, fulfilled the only reason for the Agikuyu’s survival – cheap labour. - See more at: newafricanmagazine.com/kenya-celebrates-50-years-of-hard-work-pays-off/#sthash.oMOn0lNl.dpuf3rd red high light Madd Madd World asked the question to Uhuru current PORK why the lukewarm reaction to Mandera when in Mpeketoni he sent Ruto the deputy PORK and in Kapendo he went himself while at Westgate he even convinced RAO they go together? the dead speak volumes. when it was Gikuyus (Mpeketoni being his fathers project of playing European settler games on coastals using his ethnic brethren as the storm troupers) mainly he felt it; when it was his position as CiC (APs dead in Kapendo) but when it is Luhyas, Kisiii and other lowly cadres in the hierarchy of wealth you can rot for all PORK cares. President Kenyatta is a true Kenyan in whom there is no guile. He tells it the way it is. You want security? Take charge of your own. For, the President has taken charge of his own security. He surrounds himself with hundreds of heavily armed men and women who move with him in armoured machines. He has spies allover the place, listening in to your phone and reading your text messages about your domestic affairs. His numerous homes and properties across the country are policed round the clock. Find your own solutions, the same way he has done. Earlier, as Kenya mourned, the President’s communications people posted images of a jovial President posing for photographs with fine-looking youth in far away lands. The country cried. The President smiled. He returned home to give us a dressing down on our misplaced expectations on security. That is the way it should be. For it is our privilege to have Kenyatta as our President Read more at: www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000142900/indifference-to-other-people-s-welfare-rank-high-on-our-list-of-national-values/
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Post by kamalet on Nov 30, 2014 12:57:47 GMT 3
Kamale, did I really twist your words or simply emphasize that since your friends at ATPU have the "inevitable" fallback plan of (1) renditions or (2) EJK as a final solution, to argue that their hands are tied because of lack of a law with teeth is moot. They can & often resort to being cop, judge, jury, AND executioner. So if it ain't broke, why fix it? As for solutions, haven't I alluded to some in previous posts? If you go to war with a neighboring country (or factions therein) isn't it prudent to remove a second layer of defence from their barracks & deploy them strategically in Somalia facing outposts on the Kenya side of the border? Wouldn't it make sense to have border patrols carried out by the same forces? Isn't it prudent for the CiC to demand that all AMISOM sectors that touch the Kenyan border should be policed by the KDF & not other African states with forces in Somalia? If a directive banning night travel could be passed by the transport minister when buses were killing folks wantonly in road accidents, couldn't a similar ban on night travel from Mandera & other insurgency prone areas have been in place? Shouldn't the old "convoy" system of travel that mitigated against bandits been initiated? Wait a minute. What the heck am I doing? Don't we pay Kimaiyo, Ole Lenku, & the always forgotten Rachel Omamo & Kameru hefty salaries to come up with solutions so we can safely rest in our armchairs? Didn't Ole Lenku go to Israel for "training" just days before the Mandera massacre ON OUR DIME? What did he learn while he was there or is he going to propose we build a Jerusalem style wall? We rely on the state to protect us because at the end of the day they have our billions (where do they go?) to ensure they have the right staffing, planning & equipment to get the job done. Earlier this week the UK released information they have foiled 5 terror attacks this year: www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article4076265.htmlWhen will we ever get such detailed information save for the actual attacks that end up making headlines? How long will we have to rely on the likes of Jicho Pevu to do what our spooks are employed to do, infiltrate those networks & get to know how they recruit their squads. Do we even have an idea of how many Kenyans have crossed over to Somalia to join Al Shabaab? All governments at some point end up having the odd sacking or at the very least a reshuffle. If Ole Lenku can't be sacked then surely he can be moved to a ministry more in line with what he did all his life like tourism. If Anne Waiguru of Devolution is the only performing CS to the point that she is now policing stripping in addition to Kibera clean up duties then by all means have her cover the security dockets as well. To try and get the debate back online..... You allude to outsourcing of our security to Ethiopia. Elsewhere I have been critical of this arrangement where Ethiopia is responsible for a the Somali Amisom sector that runs along our border to their own with Somali. That they would concentrate their security closer to their border is a no brainer leaving Kenya exposed whilst our forces do a fairly good job securing Kismayu! Kenya will need to go back to Amisom and ask for the reclarification of the sectors in which KDF should operate and this must include the Kenyan border sector. The present arrangement is a sure recipe for friendly fire if Kenya unilaterally attacks section inside the Ethiopia sector and it ended up killing Ethiopians! But that is a problem outside our scope as internally based terrorism is something we shall have to deal with. I do not agree that the options left to ATPU of 'outing' suspects is the route to go as it does not resolve the main problem and involves aiming and constantly missing the 'queen bee' and killing the 'worker bee' rarely forces bees to migrate! The enforcement without fear of retribution from do-gooders whose aim is never to care for the lives of the victim but that of the killer. With such a law in place, those political leaders who cause incitement leading to death will be wary of a law that gives police enough powers to not just suspect, but to arrest! As a country, we lack sufficient patriotism to resolve some of our problems and at the very worst we lack basic self discipline and it is probably the grace of God that keeps us alive despite our very best efforts at suicide. I often wonder if we had a dictator like Museveni or Kagame how far Kenya would be development wise! There is nothing you can do here without someone rushing to court to stop it - and then we have judges who will for no other reason by to be seen to be independent issuing the most stupid decisions that are neither premised on the law or simple commonsense! So like Podp suggests let us resign ourselves to manage our own security even as we misquote Uhuru's real statement. The problem is that in doing this we should not whine when the next explosion kills a relative or a friend!
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Post by b6k on Nov 30, 2014 14:44:42 GMT 3
Kamale, I didn't say we were "outsourcing" border security to Ethiopia. That would be Otishotish. I simply mentioned that under AMISOM we have allowed the sector(s) that straddle our border with Somalia to be managed by Ethiopia. When the KDF sat down with the UN bigwigs it should've been a no-brainer for KDF to demand that they manage those sectors before agreeing to change their green helmets with blue ones. I wouldn't be surprised if the prospect of the UN underwriting the costs of KDF engagements in Somalia whetted our GCG negotiators appetite too much for them to overlook the dangers of ceding control to a third party, supply lines & good sense of border protection be damned.
Whatever the ATPU is doing, legally or not, is just the tip of the iceberg. I agree with you that death squads have proved to fail in the long-run whether unleashed in Iraq or South America. Creating new law(s) that could threaten our existing rights to better fight the GWOT would leave us with legislation that will not be repealed once the battle is won since it could be (ab)used to fight new enemies. I had more in mind the bumbling kind of policing you see on day to day investigations, some of which overlap with what your friends at ATPU do. Case in point was the (mis)handling of the bomb laden Prado in Mombasa that sat in a police station for almost a week before the FBI alerted our mboys that they had an car bomb in their midst. Or the cops who flagged down a car bomber in Nairobi for driving the wrong direction & ended up dying with him as he detonated it whilst he drove into their station? What happened to a simple search of a vehicle after you've arrested its occupants, or search & seizure 101? Do you think our Keystone cops who show such blatant disregard to their own safety give a hoot about ours?
I don't agree with you that we lack patriotism or self discipline to protect ourselves. As citizens we can only do so much since we have like any other country in the world put our trust into state machinery & those who run it to DO THEIR JOBS! If time & again they have proved they aren't up to the task, it's not too much to ask them to leave their dockets dockets. As president it really is up to Uhuru to ensure he has the best (wo)man for the job in all ministries. Having just watched the cream (Dennis Itumbi & Eric N'geno) of his communications team on NTV's "The Trend" a few minutes ago, I'm not surprised why he made such a serious PR gaffe this week. Rather than admit their blaming the victim was a poor strategy they're still attempting to deflect the blame to Kenyans peculiar habits of running across highways when there's a footbridge right next or creating @alcoblowwatch to evade police dragnets.
When it comes to dictators you seem to forget the type we've had have only cared about preservation of the state not of its citizenry. We've crossed that bridge & moved on to a constitutional democracy. I hope you don't expect us to move back.
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Post by jakaswanga on Nov 30, 2014 16:39:20 GMT 3
Otishotish, Nyumba Kumi is as dead as the dodo. I see little value in KE embracing a system which no longer is effective even in TZ. Who would sieve through all the data collected by the heads of the 10 households & determine who should be investigated further as a threat to the public good? Considering Nairobi alone has a population of over 3,000,000 the number of reports generated (would they be weekly or monthly?) would run into hundreds of thousands at a time! Before we encourage citizens to police one another because the Kenya Police have failed why not use other existing administrative offices to monitor people? What, pray tell, is the work of a Chief in an urban setting? I once had to get a letter from a Chief here in Nairobi (place of residence) & was struck by the thought that the post really is as close to obsolete as one can get as he doesn't know me from Adam, at least when compared to the Chief in my Nyalgunga in the Highlands (place of origin) who can have a pretty good idea by cross referencing me as son of so & so from this or that clan, etc. B6k, I think the situation you sketch as it exists in your Nyalgunga Highlands, is mirrored throughout the –- ingoos & dalas-- rural republic at large. Below the sub- or assistant chief, we have an authority whom in dholuo we call Jaduong' Gweng'. The Old Man of the Area. The area (Gweng') is traditionally the smallest Named Geo-Unit with natural boundaries. It hardly consists of more than 50 homesteads, give and take. The Jaduong' Gweng' knows each and every homestead inside out, for he is a born local and permanent resident. Even with the new constitution, this office has not been abolished, and on the ground Nyumba Kumi thus is understood, at least in my area, as further nonsensical division. But these Jaduong' Gweng' guys have their hands busy keeping the local peace –- trespassing livestock doing themselves good on the neighbour's gardens, and other domestics --like when I come home late and drunk, and Mrs Jakaswanga is in no mood to wake up and open up, I will rant at the top of my voice, that I am heading back to Mount Kenya, to bring back all the truck-load of goats I ferried! The Jaduong' Gweng' will then visit my shameful self in the morning and admonish me to respect myself and be an example to the young. Failure to do so, he will have my buttocks whipped at the chief's camp, by a non-Luo policeman! Security? Ach, thieves or rustlers come armed with AK 47s these days. That is outside the scope of our local peace-makers. I have a different experience with the chief's camp in Kayole. One of my brothers lived there, and in the schools holidays, I and my Kipsigis staffmate used to move our matatus to the city and, in conjunction with local mungikis, operate the Kayole route. That way we could pay all our relatives upkeep and fees, and still get drunk three days a week and, just may be, indulge our paedophilic instincts by paying for our share of low-mileage (puke)touching! –--No, we do not do our female students! That is High Haram!Anyway the chief and his assistants were watu wa mtaa. They walked around and knew the place, the plots of land, the owners, the squatters, the local criminal rings. They were definitely a bastion of intelligence. The only problem is, in a city like Nairobi, this is a very dangerous thing. Lots of tough guys both sides of the law have reason to want carriers of truthful information dead. But for some tedious local grievances, petty offences, chokoraa mischief, the chiefs were a very welcome institute. Heavy crime? NO, unless we turn them into killer Wild West Sheriffs –-like the famous Jakisii of Dandora and Tyson of Huruma-Salem! (these two were notorious killer cops who cleaned the area from Donholm via Outerring road, encompassing Umoja to Huruma & Kariobangi South, and all the way to Dandora. I know because every holiday weekend after 2 a.m we would walk carefree from Awendo Bar in Dandora to Nyando bar in Kayole! Those were the days Kamalet is nostalgic for! And no, Kamalet, this was John Michuki, not Danial arap Moi!
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Post by podp on Nov 30, 2014 21:24:12 GMT 3
I think the situation you sketch as it exists in your Nyalgunga Highlands, is mirrored throughout the –- ingoos & dalas-- rural republic at large. Below the sub- or assistant chief, we have an authority whom in dholuo we call Jaduong' Gweng'. The Old Man of the Area. The area (Gweng') is traditionally the smallest Named Geo-Unit with natural boundaries. It hardly consists of more than 50 homesteads, give and take. The Jaduong' Gweng' knows each and every homestead inside out, for he is a born local and permanent resident. Even with the new constitution, this office has not been abolished, and on the ground Nyumba Kumi thus is understood, at least in my area, as further nonsensical division. But t hese Jaduong' Gweng' guys have their hands busy keeping the local peace –- trespassing livestock doing themselves good on the neighbour's gardens, and other domestics --like when I come home late and drunk, and Mrs Jakaswanga is in no mood to wake up and open up, I will rant at the top of my voice, that I am heading back to Mount Kenya, to bring back all the truck-load of goats I ferried! The Jaduong' Gweng' will then visit my shameful self in the morning and admonish me to respect myself and be an example to the young. Failure to do so, he will have my buttocks whipped at the chief's camp, by a non-Luo policeman! Security? Ach, thieves or rustlers come armed with AK 47s these days. That is outside the scope of our local peace-makers.I have a different experience with the chief's camp in Kayole. One of my brothers lived there, and in the schools holidays, I and my Kipsigis staffmate used to move our matatus to the city and, in conjunction with local mungikis, operate the Kayole route. That way we could pay all our relatives upkeep and fees, and still get drunk three days a week and, just may be, indulge our paedophilic instincts by paying for our share of low-mileage (puke)touching! –--No, we do not do our female students! That is High Haram!Those were the days Kamalet is nostalgic for! And no, Kamalet, this was John Michuki, not Danial arap Moi! 1st red high light when WECO now Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology was being built the head man aka Likuru were feared men. they did what you have written and what is in this song 2nd red highlight in Uganda instead of what we have seen our Kapendo (APs dying) and they have a full Ministry which at one point the 1st lady was their Minister. why not appoint 1st lady there instead of doing a Tuju with mobile clinics which if not maintained like tents disappear without trace. listen to Uganda's 1st lady and Minister of Karamajong a hand grenade was thrown today in Garissa and the responses in social media make good readings. let us review the past before attempting way forward If the response during and after the Westgate attack of September 2013 could be characterised as a stink bug, the government's response to the Mandera killings has been a skunk in so far as government’s handling of the situation is concerned, experts told Sunday Nation. “The government failed to assuage public anger. It clearly revealed a lack of coordination between the security arms and the executive,” said the managing director of Vickers Security Bashir Abdullahi, a retired major who served with KDF. Dr Silas Oriaso of the University of Nairobi’s School of Journalism said the response to the crisis exposed weaknesses in Jubilee’s communication team, particularly the Presidential Strategic Communications Unit (PSCU). “Most of the communication so far has been done by people who want to shift blame,” he said, pointing out that the way the strategy to provide photographic evidence was executed also backfired. www.nation.co.ke/news/Public-vents-anger-on-social-media-as-Jubilee-gaffes-grow/-/1056/2539826/-/nh96x0z/-/index.htmlso it appears insecurity is not going away even as Uhuruto supporters try to make it by excusing the blunders and the Cord family uses funerals to pour scorn to Uhuruto Jubilee government Both the President and his deputy have underscored their total confidence in the working of the two men Kenyans are asking to resign over insecurity. The Deputy President has even invented reality. He tells us we no longer need to worry about terrorists. The government killed all the one hundred of them, the very same night terrorists murdered 28 Kenyans. Read more at: www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000142900/indifference-to-other-people-s-welfare-rank-high-on-our-list-of-national-values/3rd high light this disease is now with us. in Kakamega there are so many cases of underage girls from poor families getting pregnant. a case of a headmaster impregnating a standard 6 child. so today on or is it yesterday Gado www.nation.co.ke/oped/Cartoon/-/454986/454986/-/156q6i6z/-/index.html
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Post by abdulmote on Dec 1, 2014 9:00:11 GMT 3
It is getting rather chaotic. It feels almost like Kenya us in state of panick. Not good for finding a way forward.
Pressure is mounting for the president to resign. Not that we have any better replacement if he was do so right now.
Kenya, it seems, is in a serious cultural rot. Politically, administratively and worst of all, morally and socially. We are no different to crumbling scare crow, who we are trying to dress like a human.
Questions need to be asked and problems understood from their causes of. Let us start from the word "why".
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Post by kamalet on Dec 1, 2014 9:30:39 GMT 3
I don't agree with you that we lack patriotism or self discipline to protect ourselves. As citizens we can only do so much since we have like any other country in the world put our trust into state machinery & those who run it to DO THEIR JOBS! If time & again they have proved they aren't up to the task, it's not too much to ask them to leave their dockets dockets. As president it really is up to Uhuru to ensure he has the best (wo)man for the job in all ministries. Having just watched the cream (Dennis Itumbi & Eric N'geno) of his communications team on NTV's "The Trend" a few minutes ago, I'm not surprised why he made such a serious PR gaffe this week. Rather than admit their blaming the victim was a poor strategy they're still attempting to deflect the blame to Kenyans peculiar habits of running across highways when there's a footbridge right next or creating @alcoblowwatch to evade police dragnets. When it comes to dictators you seem to forget the type we've had have only cared about preservation of the state not of its citizenry. We've crossed that bridge & moved on to a constitutional democracy. I hope you don't expect us to move back. B6k We can bury our heads in the sand..but when it comes to sacking Kimaiyo or Ole Lenku the same Kenyans shouting at the top of their voices will be claiming their tribesmen are being removed from top government posts. When it comes to terrorists, these are not martians we do not know,but Kenyans who are our neighbours and who we allow to do these things to us even when we have noticed their behaviour! The Kenyatta spinmasters are actually right about the 'peculiar' behaviour of Kenyans that includes being suicidal! They will not cooperate in the war on terror by telling on their neighbours and family involved - have you seen the pleas of innocence of a culprit by a family when the person is paraded as a thief or terror suspect? I can assure you of one thing. If we do not roll some of those gains back, you can be certain that the insecurity and terrorism will slowly turn us back and in most painful ways. Perhaps you might want to see what is happening in Mandera which is being abandoned by professionals from "Kenya". You have not appreciated the chaos in the tourist industry and in particular Mombasa where the leadership is now turning against the other with Malindi insisting it should not be listed with Mombasa. Hotels are closing, people are not travelling there...so what happens to the jobs the locals have? Tafakari hayo
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Post by b6k on Dec 1, 2014 14:07:29 GMT 3
Kamale, I think your muddling up issues here. If you're advocating for the need for tougher laws to hold terror suspects indefinitely we don't need them. As was proven in the case of the character with unsound mind who was arrested with grenades in Eastlands, a suspect can be held for more than 24 hours under existing anti-terror law. The same I believe happened to Samantha Lewthwaite's third or fourth husband who's currently facing trial in Mombasa. As we saw in Kasarani, hundreds if not thousands were held beyond 24 hours following the mop up exercise at Eastleigh. Many of them were eventually deported back to Somalia. That said you can't hold someone in perpetuity. Eventually the onus will be on our cops to come up with credible cases that can be pursued to conviction in a court of law. This is where our cops always seem to be wanting.
You can't confuse the above with the reluctance of ordinary locals in Mandera or the coast who are unwilling (or unable) to assist the authorities in identifying terror suspects. Sure some may be reluctant because they tacitly support or condone the insurgency in these regions but the great majority simply may not want to get involved either for fear of retribution from insurgents or from fear of being branded as insurgents by the very same authorities. What law can you put in place to compel people to drop the dime on their neighbors? The only way to go about it is the age old winning of "hearts & minds" angle which as Jakaswanga & I have alluded to above is done by working in tandem with existing structures, aka the wazee in the area. This was a strategy used by Moi time & again in NEP. Much as he used the stick approach in Wagalla, he often followed it up with the carrot (barazas of wazee & administration officials). Where are Uhuru's carrots or stick for that matter? As sad as it may be, probably the mass exodus from Mandera & the economic shutdown in the coast is precisely what the indigenous populace need to see that upcountry folk do add value to their region & at the end of the day we all need each other to prosper.
Unlike some, I think it's premature to call for Uhuru to dissolve the government since he still has the opportunity to reshuffle the existing one. If tribe is the issue of most concern he could easily replace Ole Lenku with Linus Kaikai who like the former will be coming from a totally different industry. At least he'll be better able to articulate his ministry's efforts or failures than Ole Lenku. Surely there can be no shortage of Kalenjin top cops to replace Kimaiyo. A reshuffle isn't an admission of defeat but a realization that some sections of his team may need new blood & a fresh approach.
The President's communication team aren't doing him any favors by supporting his gaffe. If you saw the president's address, the smirk he had on his face as he threw the security gauntlet back to Kenyans was totally inappropriate. Given that he hasn't personally addressed the 28 deaths since his return from the UAE, whether he was talking about the stripping of women or the rape of a 3 year old is neither here nor there. The way it played out was like he was talking to the dead & admonishing them for allowing themselves to be ambushed. I know a trip to the "warzone" in Mandera at this time is out of the question, but a mass memorial service in Western where 22 of the dead hailed from (like Kibaki held a mass funeral service in the Molo area during PEV) would've gone a long way to soothe the families of the massacre. It would've even been the perfect PR photo opp to showcase to the world the evil al Shabaab have wrought on Kenyan soil yet again (read: an opportunity for donor funding to terror related matters).
I said on a separate thread that he shouldn't sit on his laurels now that he had a 71% approval rating in the last polls. That spike, in my view, was the result of those who may not even be his supporters breathing a collective sigh of relief when he deftly distanced his "personal challenge" from the fate of Kenya & giving him a grudging thumbs up. Polls are just a snap shot (a debatable one at that) of one's popularity at a given point in time. If one were conducted now there's no doubt he'll be back to 36% or thereabouts. If the safety of Kenyans doesn’t give much of an impetus to motivate him to up his administration's game, then let the prospect of an enraged populace in 2017 do so...
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Post by kamalet on Dec 1, 2014 19:03:54 GMT 3
B6k
You approach to the problem fails on account of assuming the ideal world in a new constitutional order. The problem is not giving bail to suspects, that is only one of the problems.We need to give enabling legislation to intelligence gathering without the constant fear of abuse of the laws. There should be no need to opt for illegals means if the law allows it. For instance why does NIS have no power of arrest pending the handover of a suspect the competent authorities? Why must they only report after investigating B6k to the police to arrest you? Why can't they arrest you and hand you over to the police? Just how many times have police raids failed because the suspects had a tip off they are about to be arrested? We could see it as a derogation of rights, but intelligence gathering through use of phone tapping is not allowed without a court order. Can you imagine how much gets missed as the NIS seek a court order to tap the phone of a suspect? Cant there be a process where they can commence the tapping but cannot proceed for more than X days without getting court approval? I am talking about providing an environment where we can be protected from crime without necessarily taking away people's rights and when it is done, it becomes subject to supervision by another arm of government!
Take the example of Mombasa mosques. Intelligence is gathered about wrong being done in the mosques including allegations of arms being stored in the mosque. Everything is well planned without a leak and in the middle of the night, hundreds of police officers raid these premises and come out with evidence that all was not right. What was the reaction of the leaders in coast province? If the government had not been adamant that they will not re-open the mosques, the solution found would not have been effected. The mombasa raids were different to the hunt of the lone terrorist which is even more difficult. At the end of the day NIS will only tell Kimaiyo and his men that intelligence shows so and so is preparing to do A, B and C. In the ideal situation, the man should have been arrested by the NIS once they had concrete evidence that a crime will be committed and handed the man to the police. This serves two purposes, possibility of charging the man if there is sufficient evidence and in the alternative the man becomes aware that he is a know criminal suspect.
There is this constant fear of going back...but I keep asking if you are not breaking the law, why fear a law?
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Post by OtishOtish on Dec 1, 2014 20:01:35 GMT 3
There should be no need to opt for illegals means if the law allows it. For instance why does NIS have no power of arrest pending the handover of a suspect the competent authorities? Why must they only report after investigating B6k to the police to arrest you? Why can't they arrest you and hand you over to the police? Just how many times have police raids failed because the suspects had a tip off they are about to be arrested? So leaks are to be dealt with by giving the NIS more powers in relation to arrests? Interesting. And who is responsible for the leaks in such cases? The people who have the information to start with? Exactly what is the underlying problem? He, he, he, ... that is a funny one, given the manner in which the law has been, and still is being, abused in Kenya.
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