Security in Kenya starts with the security guard on the door!

Posted: 11/11/2013

RPS's consultant in Nairobi is working with companies in Kenya to ensure that their staff have appropirate training to stay safe in the aftermath of the Westgate shopping mall incident.  As crime increases and more and more armed robberies and burglaries take place, every day life in Kenya is becoming a more dangerous affair.

The Nation, Nairobi's leading newspaper, ran an article last month about security men and women. RPS looks at this article and makes comment on some of the security measures it has seen since being there. 

With the current realities of Al-Shabaab and other terrorism groups, nobody wants to take any chances over their security.  Before the terrorism threats, Kenyans used to gain entry into all buildings with ease. Not any more, so everyone says. 

Today metal detectors are commonplace, and even just getting into my hotel you pass by a nice shiney new metal detector.  

Pass by being the key words.  Its sits there looking forlorn whlst it beeps as people pass by over a metre away, but not through it. I am not sure if that is because noone knows how to use it or whether there are actually not enough staff to work it all day.  There are certainly two very smiley security guards who have greeted us with gusto and enthusiasm each day, but neither have gone near the metal detector.  It is like the elephant in the room!

I always wonder about the effectiveness of these gadgets and maybe it is time to start asking about the effectiveness of the security guards. let's look at what the Nation newspaper found.

Even with the supposedly increased surveillance, are Kenyans any safer?  The Westgate Mall incident raises many questions about the effectiveness of the so-called security guards, according to the Nation.

They asked whether it was a case of the security guards being  ill-trained or whether some were conspiring with the criminals? If a place like Westgate can be attacked in broad daylight, then how safe are remote areas in the countryside?

FIRST SUSPECT

Whenever there are cases of theft or robbery in Nairobi, the first suspects are always the security guards, said the Nation. On a number of occasions, it has been found that bank robberies were committed with the full knowledge of security guards.

It has often been the case that many security guards have collaborated with criminals to rob their employers of the very valuables they are employed to protect.

The Nation may have a point but before condemning these security guards, let us consciously examine a number of facts about the nature of their work.

To start with, they do the most risky job often without sufficient preparation. They spend the night in the cold, where criminals lurk, with just a bow and several arrows, figuratively speaking. They have sticks and torches whlst the criminals they are employed to keep at bay use sophisticated weapons.

Second, the security guards are overworked and underpaid. The amount of money they earn always puts them in the way of temptation.

Some of the security guards protect property that is worth millions of shillings yet they earn less than Sh10,000 at the end of the month. What will keep some of these guards from falling into temptation and stealing from their masters?  

RPS believes it would be wrong to tar everyone with the same brush, yet despite the Government offering Kenyans platitudes that security is tight and that it has increased, it remains to be seen whether this is everywhere or only in the key areas; wherever they are.

Maybe it is not just a question of whether security guards are honest or not, maybe it is a question that it is hard to keep up increased levels of security for very long, as the UK knows only too well. We wonder how long this level of increased security with all its shiney unused metal detectors, will last and whether indeed al-Shabaab will be just biding its time until Kenya's colective guard is dropped.

RPS will be working in Kenya until the end of November, if you require any security training or advice please us in the first instance at [email protected]

 

For the full story: http://www.nation.co.ke/lifestyle/DN2/security-begins-with-the-man-or-woman-at-the-door/-/957860/2053248/-/kc8g5r/-/index.html

Photo: Lavington.olx.co.ke

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