The government is contemplating replacing National Police Service officers guarding key establishments with officers from the National Youth Service, Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua has said.
The DP said police officers would be deployed across the country to fight banditry and crime while the NYS would be paid for their services.
“Going forward, we want to have a discussion with government ministries, parastatals and other corporations to have a concrete plan on how to remove our officers from the security forces to go and deal with crime, so we can have NYS personnel man those offices at a fee,” he said.
According to Gachagua, NYS officers are disciplined enough to man the various premises which have for long been under the watch of the National Police Service.
“It shouldn’t be free so that we can create a revolving fund to train more people. That is a conversation we want to have. We want our officers from the National Police Service to go and fight bandits and criminals, and the NYS personnel, because they are disciplined, they can do most of the work in terms of controlling people coming in and out of buildings,” he said.
Gachagua noted that the plan has always been in place but “nobody has really followed it up properly so that it becomes an official government policy.”
“We want to have a conversation about payment because we don’t want them to offer a free service so that the money can be invested within the service to train more people,” he said.
DP Gachagua spoke on Thursday during the official opening of this year’s Nation-Huawei Job Fair at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre in Nairobi.
