Community Policing as a National Security Strategy in East Africa: Comparative Study of Kenya and Tanzania

Abstract

The promotion of community policing in East Africa (especially Kenya and Tanzania); has been criticized as typically entailing the imposition of best practice models derived elsewhere with little regard for context. The general objective of the study was to critically examine the relationship between national security and community policing strategies in East Africa by identifying the challenges in community policing and security systems in place. More specifically, the study was: To investigate the existing community policing strategies in Kenya and Tanzania; To examine the effectiveness of community policing strategies on police-citizen relations and to determine the challenges and the gaps existing between the community policing and national security in Kenya and Tanzania. The theoretical framework used in this study was Kuhn theory of revolution and system theory. The overall method adopted for the study was the Case Study method. For data generation, use of primary and secondary sources were employed, where questionnaires was used to collect data. The study had its main focus on East Africa in particular Tanzania and Kenya. Primary data collection was done in Nairobi, Kenya and Dodoma in Tanzania. The two field study locations were chosen because they are the capital cities and administrative headquarters of the two countries under investigation for both Kenya Police and Tanzania Police; in addition they are more likely to encounter criminal activities due to high population. In this study, the targeted population from which general conclusions were drawn from covered four categories, namely OCD, OCS, police, and citizens. The populations which were sampled targeted about 200 respondents across the board; 100 from Kenya and 100 from Tanzania. The study adopted purposive and random sampling technique to select respondents. Based on the findings it was noted that the perception on impact of CP in reducing fear of crime is good and satisfactory. Generally, the study revealed that there is perceived improvement of CP in reducing fear of crime in Nairobi, Kenya and Dodoma in Tanzania. CBP in practice includes: police and community training and capacity building, the development of a national CBP policy, strategic planning and pilot CBP at the local level; Pilot CBP programmes can include community safety/information centres and support for local partnership safety projects. As observed overally, the piloting of CBP has improved trust and cooperation between the police, civil society and the communities. It was concluded that; the sustainability of CP in Kenya and Tanzania depends on improved policy environment, skilled, knowledgeable and motivated human resource, sustainable financial systems, equipment and technological systems. For the Tanzanian case, the concept has taken root unlike for the Kenyan case that is still making the baby steps and this is because Tanzania adopted communist approach which became a culture allowing the community policing strategy to take root more quickly. Kenya on the other end adopted the capitalist approach hence adopting community policy has picked albeit slowly. The study recommends that, there is a need for the governments to develop national policy on CP that will guide on better police practice, build trust of people to the police, enhancing community engagement and improvement of police as well as local government agencies hence reducing fear of crime xii