Nkaissery extends Nyumba Kumi team’s term

Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery has extended the mandate of the Nyumba Kumi Initiative team to 2018.

In a Gazette notice dated December 18, Major General (Rtd) Nkaissery said the team should charge with providing a forum for public participation in security issues will work for another three years.

The CS also gave the team, officially known as the Committee on Implementation of Citizen Participation in Security in Kenya, new tasks that will involve proposing laws on how security agencies should engage with the public on security issues.

“To advance this process of implementation of citizen participation in security, I have extended the term of the committee with a further three years with effect from November 7, 2015,” Maj (Rtd) Nkaissery said in the notice.

The Nyumba Kumi Initiative was formed in November 2013 in response to a string of terror attacks, gang violence and robberies around the country.

It was meant to be a forum where people in villages and estates in urban areas were required to know their neighbours in a bid to ensure public participation in security programmes.

The team was charged with raising security education by forming clusters of households to help them “say what they see, hear or suspect in a structured manner,” according to an earlier gazette notice in 2013.

At the time, the government argued it was unable to provide security because some people with knowledge of suspects were not coming forth for fear of victimisation or for thinking security was the obligation of the government.

In a speech delivered during the Mashujaa Day celebrations in 2013, President Uhuru Kenyatta argued security starts with individuals whose role is to provide information to the police.

Chaired by Joseph Kaguthi, the Committee has previously held forums around the country for people to contribute ideas on safety, and went ahead to cluster communities.

But critics charged that the committee was unable to assist nomadic communities who face cattle rustling, because it is difficult to cluster those communities into a number of households. In urban areas, it was criticised for encroaching on privacy.

But Mr Kaguthi maintains it is the people’s duty to suggest security solutions to the government.

In the gazette notice last week, the Interior CS argued the extended term should provide a “transformative shift” in the way the police and the public cooperate in security matters.

The team is also composed of Lt-Col (rtd) Francis Charles Mugambi, Ms Nuria Abdullahi, Dr Salim Ndemo, Dr Francis Sang, Ms Purity Sein Karariet, Maj Rama Ndegwa Mwangombe, Mr Nkoidila Ole Lankas, Ms Caren Wakoli, Zippy Nzisa, Ibrahim Duale, Nancy Wambui Gachoka and Immanuel Ichor Imana.