Murkomen, Sakaja Set For Benchmarking Tour In New York & London
Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen and Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja will lead delegations to New York and London next week for a benchmarking trip ahead of the construction of a Nairobi Metropolitan Police Unit.
“Next week, there is a delegation to New York and also to London, led by CS Murkomen and me,” Sakaja said in an interview with Hot96 on Wednesday evening.
According to Sakaja, the administration has consulted with the New York Police Department and the mayor, London’s Metropolitan Police and the mayor, and officials in Rome.
The unit is anticipated to be operating by July, but Sakaja expressed doubt that the two tiers of government will reach President William Ruto’s deadline.
“The president wanted it by July. I don’t know if we will make it, but we are trying to do it as quickly as possible,” he said.
Sakaja described the unit’s functioning, stating that it would be constitutionally accountable to the interior secretary while the county administration handled day-to-day matters.
“Just like in New York, it is under the mayor. On day-to-day deployment and strategic interventions, it responds to the city,” he said.
The proposed arrangement is likely to raise questions over how a county-managed unit fits within Kenya’s constitutional framework, under which policing is a national function.
Speaking after a high-level meeting on the unit’s formation, Murkomen said the committee behind it was working on key foundational elements of the new structure.
These include the administrative framework, service standing orders and standard operating procedures that will guide the unit once it becomes operational.
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Sakaja said the unit would comprise mostly young officers and would be driven largely by smart policing, including the use of cameras for crime detection and a board that would include residents’ associations.
“We need to have visible patrols. Every 50 metres or so, you need to see a metropolitan police officer,” he said.
“We want to have patrol vehicles and a different management that is not like the national police service.”
Officers will be required to wear body cameras, which Sakaja said would be procured by the national government with a contribution from the county.
“To prevent incidents, they will have mandatory body cameras,” he said.
Murkomen, Sakaja Set For Benchmarking Tour In New York & London
