I wanted to post this article because I found it pretty awful. It is one thing when politicians are corrupt, when they steal money from the public and force people to live in poverty as they live lavishly. However, this article is about the corruption of police officers - the very people who are supposed to keep you safe. In my mind, when a politician is corrupt, the public can take safe haven with the police officers who are there for the public's safety. Yet, here are a few quotes from the article: "'On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give our police a 2,' said Macharia Njeru, the chairman of Kenya’s new police oversight board, citing corruption allegations, human rights abuses, extrajudicial killings, failed inquiries and lost public trust." Or, "In just one five-month period in 2007, the report said, the police were suspected of killing hundreds of people." How about, "The national police service has intentionally been kept weak for decades so it could be manipulated by politicians." As someone who is planning to travel back to Kenya, this article has unearthed a new fear that, unfortunately, is very very real.
Article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/16/world/africa/killing-of-student-further-sullies-kenyan-police.html?hp
Yea this is a scary post. I have a feeling that the police force is pretty similar in many African countries as it is quite a useful tool for politicians to use to their advantage. Keeping it weak allows them to manipulate it, like you said, and it also keeps the police officers poor, un-trained, and un-happy. All of these play into a police force being so corrupt, it is quite a sad problem. With no one to turn to for help, citizens have little hope for solving problems they cant handle on their own. The quote about hundreds of killings in five months is pretty sickening. I wonder if these were mainly alleged criminals or what?
ReplyDeleteThough this is very unfortunate, im not surprised to be honest. If you were to go to any developing country you will see that corruption is very rampant amongst the police force, as shown by the fact that you could simply pay them off to leave you alone or they look for opportunities to gain bribes. Police officers like the rest of the population are people with families who are simply trying to get by and the power they are given opens up many opportunities for them though it may be at the expense of others. I do not believe that police officers are have a higher sense of morals than everyone else, but what allows them to follow the rules is the threat of being caught, prosecuted or embarrassed through enforcement or open media, yet without that they are free to do as they like. An interesting and relevant event could be seen in how the Arab spring started. What happened was a police officer destroyed a normal citizens food cart, then he went and burned himself in protest infront of the capital building which triggered the revolution. Another one is how Hosni Mubarak used the police force to protect his government against both the people and military, this shows that in many cases and in developing countries, they see themselves as their own political body free to do as they like.
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