Security chiefs pledge to share intelligence

Top Kenya Defence Forces and National Intelligence Service officers have resolved to share information to address security threats facing the country.

At the same time, Defence Cabinet Secretary Raychelle Omamo has called for adequate funding of the two agencies to enable them to effectively deal with threats to the country.

“We shall share everything that we think pertinent for the protection of our country and enhancement of your knowledge. We appreciate the vital role you play when you interrogate us and report on matters on mandate, operations and strategic requirement of the national sector,” said Ms Omamo during the close of a two-day security meeting in Mombasa on Saturday.

The KDF and NIS officers also met the National Assembly’s Defence and Foreign Relations committee for scrutiny of their work.

The closed-door meeting at Voyager Hotel in Mombasa was convened on the backdrop of criticism on the part of the spy agency’s failure to prevent Al-Shabaab attacks in Lamu, where more than 80 people were killed, and the Mandera bus and quarry massacres that also claimed the lives of 80 other Kenyans last year.

Ms Omamo told the committee that KDF and NIS complement each other towards enhancement of national security.

Ms Omamo noted that adequate funding was “needed towards salaries and allowance review for KDF personnel, complex security operations within and outside the country, military modernisation programmes and operations and maintenance among others”.

EMERGING CHALLENGES

She said emerging security challenges, complex international organised criminal groups, proliferation of small arms and regional social-political instability had stretched budgetary allocations.

“The sector’s intention is to seek an enhanced budgetary ceiling to tackle these issues,” she said.