Chairman of Independent Police Oversight Authority (IPOA) Isaak Hassan has said they have so far investigated 34 cases which were prosecuted by the Director of Public Prosecutions.
He said they have over 250 ongoing court cases across the country.
He said they faced challenges investigating some cases because it involves police officers.
“It is difficult when investigating police officers and you require evidence from other police officers to protect their name,” Hassan said.
He said they have talked to the Inspector General of National Police Service Douglas Kanja about lack of cooperation from police officers.
On abductions he said they sent their staff to investigate and found out that the police were not involved.
Hassan said they have a challenge with being understaffed noting that their staff are overworked.
“IPOA is 10 years old and has 284 staff out of which 77 are investigators. It is supposed to investigate a police force that was established more than a century with 120,000 police officers spread across the country. You can imagine the scope of work,” Hassan said.
He said they are going to parliamentary committee on administration of justice and national security to petetion for more funding.
“In the last budget, we wanted to employ 23 additional staff but we were denied. The police will employ 10,000 more so try and compare,” Hassan said.
He said IPOA aims to restore confidence of Kenyans in the police service.
He spoke in Meru when he visited their regional office.
He said they will go round the country visiting all their offices.
“We were in Nyeri on Monday. We will visit Embu and Garissa and go to Kisumu and Eldoret. We have got nine regional offices. We should have 47 offices but because of lack of resources we only have nine regional offices,” Hassan Said.
He said they got feedback from the civil society which will help in them in future.
“We want to develop a new strategic plan to guide us in the next six years. It will be guided by the feedback from Kenyans,” he said.
Hassan was accompanied by IPOA Vice Chairman Ann Wanjiku and other members.
