It's just a little fuel for police Land Cruiser; ni kitu kidogo tu

When I was young, there was a joke that went something like this: It is a few minutes after mid-day. A policeman suddenly discovers there is no unga (maize flour) in the house. But then, he confidently instructs his wife to start boiling water for cooking ugali. He dresses up in his policeman uniform, puts on his policeman beret, hangs a pair of policeman handcuffs conspicuously on his trousers, and wears his policeman boots.

He rushes to the armoury, picks a G3 Assault Rifle and calmly walks to the nearest public road. The idea is to look like a no-nonsense police officer on duty. And sure, a few minutes later, he comes back with a 2 kg packet of maize meal, 1kg of beef, onions and tomatoes. Simple. Straight-forward. No shots fired. Nobody injured. And the family has a hearty meal...at someone’s expense, of course.

"Garbage in, garbage out" is a concept explaining that the quality of an output from a system or a decision-making process is directly determined by the quality of the input. In essence, if you provide flawed, or low-quality input (garbage in), you will inevitably receive flawed, unreliable, or unusable results (garbage out). In Computer Science and Programming, if a programme is fed incorrect or incomplete data, it will produce inaccurate results, regardless of how well-designed the programme is. 

This principle does not just apply to computers and other information processing devices. The concept cuts across and highlights the crucial need for accurate, high-quality input for any system to produce meaningful and reliable outcomes.

Since independence, we have used a dangerously flawed system to hire personnel to join our security forces. The result we get is an incompetent service, faulty decisions, operational inefficiencies, increased costs, and damaged reputation, particularly in the policing context.

It is a poorly guarded secret that a good number of our serving police officers joined the “service” through bribery. Sad tales abound of parents who sold land to raise the requisite bribes for their child to go to Kenya Police College, Kiganjo, or the Administration Police Training College at Embakasi.

And it is not only the police. My neighbour sold one acre and gave away Sh580,000 so that his child could join the Kenya Wildlife Service College. When the child reported, he was told that his letter was a fake and was advised to leave without looking behind lest he was arrested and charged with forgery.

A police officer who joined the force by the normal means of bribery cannot, and should not be faulted for engaging in a normal, ordinary practice of taking bribes, whether in fuel or otherwise. It does not matter how many anti-corruption workshops and seminars he attends in one week because the “facilitator“ of the workshop is also likely a product of bribery. His immediate boss might also have joined the force through the normal bribery channels. Garbage in, garbage out.

Before Interior CS Kipchumba Murkomen said it boldly and loudly, all adult Kenyans knew that victims of crime visiting a police station are usually asked to “remove fuel” in order for the police to go and arrest suspects. You are a fool if you turn up with a five-litre container full of diesel. What the CS stated is actually the rule, rather than the exception. An ordinary Kenyan would be very amused, if not utterly surprised, if you reported a criminal incident at a police station and you are told to accompany police officers, in a police car, using police fuel, to the scene of crime, without being asked for fuel!

In fact, if such a thing happened to you, be very suspicious of those police officers. It could be a set-up to “change the case” and have you arrested instead, because it is simply not possible for a police Land Cruiser to leave a police station without a crime victim giving money for fuel. Unless, of course, they are going to raid a chang’aa den or beat up protesters in a maandamano. I don’t know of any other scenario.

Police officers are very ingenious and innovative. It is called “Akili ya askari”. They have not been sitting waiting for Murkomen to advise wananchi on the need for being patriotic by contributing a little cash to fuel the police Land Cruisers. They have been asking for and receiving kitu kidogo for ages. The difference is that with Murkomen’s public endorsement of corruption, every police officer is likely to quote the CS when demanding a little money for fuel, food, uniform, grenades, guns and bullets, tear-gas, stationery and entertainment or whatever else they spend the bribe money on. And why not?

The police slogan, 'Utumishi kwa Wote' is today rather misleading, worn out, too ambitious and a relic of the past. In the same way they reviewed and phased out the Kenya Police Force for National Police Service, the current slogan is outdated and they should find a fitting slogan that is in sync with the realities and values of the current policeman. I humbly suggest, “Utumishi Kinjaaro” or better still, “Utumishi kwa Fedha”. Or, yes, “Utumishi kwa kitu”. Choose one, I won’t charge any kitu.

In the corporate world, employees are given targets and delivery timelines. Targets and timelines are important components of prudent management. It has been whispered that this corporate approach has been introduced in the National Police Service, with superb results. The concept was likely to have resounding success among police officers, given that at Kiganjo, recruits are taught that “Amri ni kubwa kuliko mwenye ametoa amri” (An order is way more important than whoever issues the order).

It has been said that senior officers routinely order their juniors to collect bribes on their behalf. It could be an OCS instructing those under his charge. It could be a Traffic Base Commander quietly ordering junior traffic officers to bring him a certain amount of money. It has been confirmed that in fact, your ordinary traffic officer at a roadblock or that officer apparently on routine beat is under immense pressure from afande to deliver a certain amount of money within a specific time-frame.

If such an officer thought afande was joking and fails to deliver, he will soon find out the difference in distance and “perks” between Port Police Station in Mombasa and El-Wak Police Station in Wajir. Those officers who take such instructions with gladness, gusto and machismo soon find their way back to Kiganjo Police Academy for promotion training. Garbage in, garbage out.