Lurambi MP Titus Kamala has said officers at Bukura police station in the constituency are reluctant to occupy a new station he constructed using NG-CDF funds.
Khamala said the officers are creating complications on occupation of the station because they are not ready to leave Bukura Agricultural College, where they are currently hosted.
He said officers at the station and a team in charge of National Police Service in charge of development in Western region were present during commissioning of the station and demanded that his office constructs a gate, a toilet, installs electricity and fits more windows on the cells before they occupy it.
The MP said that the bills of quantities for the project were supplied by police and wondered why issues being raised over failure of the officers to occupy the station were not included.
“I know that the officers at Bukura police station are creating complications because they do not want to come out of the college, where they receive free food,” he said.
“We are going to address every detail they have raised and they must prepare to come out of their comfort zone of free food and combat crime.”
The legislator said officers abetting crime were known and that he had taken up the matter with higher NPS authorities and if need be would escalate the to the PS Interior.
But Western regional police commander Kiprino Langat said the officers will not move to the new station because of the change of commencement dates for the project from 2019-2020 to 2023-2024 by the NG-CDF office.
“We must do due diligence and the change of the project’s dates of implementation could become an audit query, which we’re not ready to deal with,” he said.
“The electricity connection to the station was tapped from the nearby market and Kenya Power would consider this an illegal connection. We are even contemplating removing our colours.”
But the MP said that the change of dates of implementation of the project had nothing to do with NPS as it was being constructed by NG-CDF and not the Ministry of Interior.
“This is just a gift we are giving them. Anything that arises out of the project conception and implementation will come to us and not NPS,” he said.
Khamala said that electricity was tapped from the nearby market for purposes of launching the project.
He said that it is the police who should apply for connection from Kenya Power and only forward the quotation to his office for payment.
“Moving forward, NG-CDF will not spend money on police stations because of such complications. We’ll focus on building schools and supporting construction and renovation of offices for chiefs’ and their assistants,” he said.
