Rethinking Kenya’s National Police Service Recruitment Model Towards Competence and Merit-Based Process for Selecting Recruits: A comparison of Kenyan National Police Service and Northern Territory Police Force 2002-2022

Abstract

Police recruitment in Kenya has been problematic with claims of unethical practices including corruption, nepotism, favouritism, political interference as well as patronage featuring prominently among the citizenry, media and at times becoming a subject of research.
Recommendations to address this topical issue have been suggested in the past and it may be argued that the Kenya National Police Service (KNPS) has operationalised some of these suggestions, yet the problem persists.
While this paper agrees with Baker 2018 (cited in Hope 2018, p. 13) analysis that police reforms do not happen overnight, based on global police reforms experience, it will argue that the prescriptions provided so far (e.g., Hope 2018; Nyamu, 2019; Wasike, 2005) to deal with police recruitment lacks substantive and nuanced zeal required to fix the problem. This research project takes a different approach by placing the emphasis on the recruitment model itself to address an area of further study as suggested by Wasike (2005, p.68). It proposes a radical solution in the shape of a ‘competent recruitment’ model that shall promote merit in recruitment and selection of police recruits in the KNPS.