When the State hires thugs to fight its citizens, it loses war on criminals

A system that uses criminals to fight its battles cannot fight crime. It’s not merely a contradiction but it’s a confession. Such a State is not at war with crime; it is in love with it. It is not repulsed by vice but it is entertained by it. Crime, for such a system, is not a threat to be vanquished but a partner to be recruited, a friend to be rewarded, and an ally to be paraded.

This is Kenya’s current dilemma. The people have long called this a lying government. Not as an insult, but as a conclusion drawn from patterns too repeated to ignore. And when citizens raise their voices, the State fights back, often with fury and threats. Yet, in recent days, cover-up attempts by senior officers have been exposed and unravelling in broad daylight.

Whether it’s manipulated reports, conveniently missing footage, or altered public records, the trail of lies has been laid bare. And now it is clear: the people have been right all along. Lying is not a side effect, it is central to the operations of the ruling political machine.

Scripture is piercing in its judgment. Lies are the devil’s mother tongue. When deception becomes the language of government, the source of its inspiration is not divine. It is demonic. And it doesn’t stop there. The partners of such a system are equally revealing.

No angel seeks help from a demon unless the demon is disguised as an angel. So too, a State that secures itself with goons and weaponises violence as strategy has revealed its true nature: it is one of them. It speaks the dialect of intimidation, walks in the rhythm of corruption, and plots using betrayal as its compass.

In such a context, governance ceases to be a noble pursuit. It morphs into a choreography of criminal manoeuvres. Deception replaces policy. Violence becomes the official language. Betrayal is the currency of relationships.

What appears as national strategy is often nothing more than backroom scheming. Alliances are crafted not for the public good but for personal protection. Power is no longer an assignment—it is an addiction.

But there’s one truth systems like these always forget: criminals remain true to their nature. They serve no cause but their own. Even as they are deployed to silence dissent, intimidate the press, or infiltrate protests, they are simultaneously plotting their next betrayal.

Their loyalty is purely transactional. Their allegiance is draped in suspicion. Their handshake always conceals a dagger.

So while the State imagines it is using them, it is actually being used. And the end of such an arrangement is not security — it is sabotage.

The poison seeps into every artery of the State: from ministries to law enforcement, from elections to procurement. And before long, the system begins to collapse not from foreign attack, but from internal rot.

This is Kenya’s quiet crisis. We are not just facing economic hardship or political instability. We are facing a spiritual unravelling. A deep ethical erosion masked by press briefings and sanctified by silence in places of supposed moral authority.

The real scandal is not just that this is happening but that many have become numb to it. We no longer gasp when a fraudster becomes a financier of policy. We no longer flinch when violence is unleashed on peaceful citizens. We do not blink when churches become campaign arenas for politicians with criminal reputations. Our moral shock has been dulled. We are adjusting to darkness.

Yet even in the thick of this, truth remains undefeated. Nothing can silence the truth.
Not barbed wire. Not switched-off signals. Not master cover-up operatives. Truth travels with the wind. To suppress it is to chase the wind. It rises to the mountaintops and declares itself—without booking an appointment in anyone’s diary.

This is why cover-ups fail. Why propaganda eventually falls apart. Because truth, unlike lies, has no expiry date. It lingers. It convicts. It returns, even when exiled. And it ultimately exposes all systems that are built on deception.

Which leads us to the inevitable outcome: what begins as clever gamesmanship ends as self-destruction. The State that thought it could flirt with criminality without consequences finds itself devoured from within.

The betrayal it once outsourced is turned on itself. The gangs it empowered now demand a seat at the table. The lies once told for convenience now become the narrative it cannot escape.

This is how empires of crime fall, not from conquest, but from collapse. They are weighed down by their own treachery. And when they fall, they do not just bring down leaders. They bring down institutions. They leave generations disillusioned. They dismantle trust.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. There is still time to choose a different path. A path where truth is not an enemy, but a foundation. Where governance is not about manipulation, but about mission. Where leadership is not about personal survival, but national service.

This requires more than a regime change. It requires a regime of the heart. A collective moral uprising. Citizens who no longer clap for corruption. Religious leaders who refuse to bless it. Professionals who stop laundering it with expertise. Journalists who dig even when threatened. Youth who rise not just with chants—but with convictions.

It requires us to say clearly and unapologetically: we cannot keep normalising criminality and expect national renewal. You cannot consecrate a country while shielding cartels. You cannot speak of integrity while dining with the corrupt.

The line must now be drawn. Kenya is being drawn into a dangerous intimacy with criminality. Unless this union is broken, and unless the State and syndicate are torn apart we risk losing the nation we dreamed of. The future will not be built on deception.

If we don’t act now, the line between the country and cartel will disappear. We must rise and reclaim the moral centre.