Before you vote: the truth about security in Kerio Valley

Did the government give the residents of Baringo guns to defend themselves with?

“Baadaye wanakuja hapa na kupea watu bunduki. Hiyo ni kionyesha kwamba ulinzi wa usalama uneshinda serikali, were unapewa buduki, ujilinde wewe mwenyewe.” Nasa presidential candidate Raila Odinga at a rally in Baringo County on May 25.

The Nasa presidential candidate was referring to an incident on Monday, February 27, when Deputy President William Ruto came to Kerio Valley and commissioned 230 police reservists at Chesongoch Catholic Church.

DP Ruto was returning to the area, having travelled there the previous Friday, February 24, when he ordered that armed bandits should not be spared, but shot.

The deployment of reservists was part of a bigger deployment. On January 3, 2017 Rift Valley Regional Coordinator Wanyama Musiambo stated the government would recruit around 3,200 reservists to keep order in the Kerio Valley, and on March 1, the National Police Service put out a statement that the government had recruited 1,739 reservists to bolster the existing 7,609 since the beginning of 2017.

POLICE COURSES

An April 12 report in the Daily Nation states that 1,200 police reservists were deployed to conflict ridden areas in the Rift Valley. However, these reserves are yet to be trained.

“They will be trained on some police courses including discipline and proper handling of firearms such as cleaning and other basics,” Mr Musiambo said on April 12. “We know training should have preceded issuance of guns but because the reservists are know the terrain, we decided to use them right away.”

While there seems to be a long term programme on the part of the government to bolster security with police reservists who are valued because they hail from the locality and have superior understanding of the terrain, the fact that they are untrained means they essentially remain local people with guns.

However, reservists answer to police commanders, and the police themselves remain active in Kerio Valley. So it is difficult to conclude that citizens have been armed and abandoned to their fate.