Interior and National Administration Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen has called for greater citizen participation in intelligence gathering and information sharing as the government seeks to strengthen community policing and public involvement in security matters.

Murkomen said information provided by communities can become an important intelligence resource if the government develops effective systems for collecting, analysing and turning local reports into strategic intelligence.

The CS said repeated reports from different communities could help security agencies identify emerging patterns and anticipate potential risks before they escalate.

“Ten communities reporting similar patterns is a signal that can reveal a pattern, enabling us to anticipate future risks and guide policy. It then becomes strategic intelligence,” Murkomen said.

He cited Rwanda’s experience in citizen participation in strategic intelligence, saying Kenya could draw lessons from the model while using the Jukwaa La Usalama platform to strengthen cooperation between citizens and the government.

According to Murkomen, Jukwaa La Usalama provides an opportunity to make citizen participation a permanent component of security governance in Kenya.

He said the government was committed to institutionalising the platform to give Kenyans a structured avenue to raise security concerns and participate in decision-making on matters affecting their communities.

Murkomen, however, said the success of Jukwaa La Usalama should not be measured by the number of meetings held, but by the actions arising from those engagements, issues resolved, response times and the changes experienced by communities.

“We will therefore continue to enrich the model, creating a continuous two-way relationship, identifying problems, connecting those problems to multi-agency action, and reporting back on what has changed,” he said.

The CS made the remarks at the National Defence College in Nairobi, where he delivered a lecture on Citizen Participation as a Strategic Pillar of National Security.