What does reported crime data tell us about Kenya’s economy?

What you need to know:

  • Rates of homicide are a sharp pointer about the overall sense of personal and collective security, in addition to being an indicator of the effectiveness of the provision of security as a public service.
  • Vehicle thefts in Kenya are well reported because of the economic value of the asset to the holder and the requirement by insurers.

Kenyans, based on conversations in the media in which they express well-informed opinions and sometimes conjecture, are concerned with their individual security.

These conversation often take it as a given that personal security is poor, and that the tendency for violence and possibility of real injury from robbery and other crimes has been rising.

Strong opinions have driven a predictable response, with security services asserting the claim that more public resources are a solution to the crime issues Kenyans face.

It becomes important, therefore, to examine published crime data in order to understand whether there is a crime wave in Kenya at all, and whether responses to it are sensible.

Based on careful examination of the trends evident in the Statistical Abstract since 2006, and leaving out 2008 as an outlier, some trends can be seen.

POLICING EFFORT

First, homicide is by all definitions the most extreme form of violation of the rights of an individual. For that reason, homicide rates will be a sharp pointer about the overall sense of personal and collective security, in addition to being an indicator of the effectiveness of the provision of security as a public service.

Knowing that Kenya’s population grows by a number slightly above one million people annually, the data shows that the number of homicides adjusted for this increase has been rising at a lower rate than population growth.

Despite this, if the modest but steady growth rate between 2010 and 2012 continues, then the number of victims of homicide in Kenya could double in 41 years. In sum, the policing effort is not going well.

MYTH OF RURAL SAFETY

Staying with the issue of homicide, it is evident that with the exception of the northeastern part of Kenya, the residents of Nairobi have the lowest risk of suffering from homicide.

To put this in perspective, Nairobi bears close to 9 per cent of the country’s population and reports 7.5 per cent of all homicides in Kenya. The residents of Nairobi are 15 per cent less likely to suffer from homicide than other citizens.

This information beats the myth that rural areas are necessarily safer than urban areas in Kenya.

It is possible to attribute the relative safety of Nairobi to the fact that its working population has the highest average incomes, and also to the fact that economic activity is most concentrated there.

CHANGING NATURE OF OFFENCES

Secondly, economic crimes mark the degree to which violations of property rights occur. Economic crimes in Kenya are classified as those including false accounting, currency forgery and obtaining property by false pretences.

Dissecting this data shows that the crimes are distributed among Kenya’s major urban areas because these are crimes that are committed in the course of exchange of services, and therefore more likely to occur around urban enterprises.

In 2012, economic crimes rose by 11 per cent relative to the previous year, with 30 per cent of these crimes were reported in Nairobi.

Projecting that growth rate shows that the cluster of crimes could double in less than 6.5 years. It suggests as well that reforms in the Judiciary should take account of the changing nature of offenses that the justice system will have to process.

Vehicle thefts in Kenya are well reported because of the economic value of the asset to the holder, and the requirement by insurers to report such thefts. The security of vehicles is usually an essential consideration, given the significance of vehicle ownership to both enterprises and households.

FREEZE IN RATE OF THEFTS

In the last three years up to 2012, theft of vehicles in absolute numbers has declined slightly. Considering that the number of registered vehicles has grown in that time, this shows that the security of vehicles as property has improved.

The reasons for this may involve police effort, but conversations with many drivers and personal experience at the Institute of Economic Affairs suggest that the improvements in security devices by private firms explains this freeze in the rate of thefts.

The survey of crime data over the past half decade suggests that Nairobi is surely the safest place in Kenya in terms of personal security, but is less so regarding property such as vehicles. In other words, the property crimes landscape should be policed differently from other forms of crime.

Yet, looking at the methods used in the recruitment of police officers this week, I find little evidence that this nuanced picture of property and personal crimes is understood.

Kwame Owino is the chief executive officer of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA-Kenya), a public policy think tank based in Nairobi. Twitter: @IEAKwame