While a traffic cop is the least likely candidate to shoot his boss or fellow colleagues, an occupational therapist at the Mathari National Teaching and Referral Hospital argues that AP officers have no sense of consequence, unlike regular cops largely due to the nature of their training.
The medic posits that the propensity for APs to take life under the slightest provocation can be attributed to nature of their training that places emphasis on physical skills - and not on the laws of the land - and “therefore they least understand consequences of such actions.”
Training syllabus for regular and administration police has however been synchronized. Recruits at National Police College (Kiganjo Campus), National Police College (Embakasi A Campus) and National Police College (Embakasi B Campus) are taught the same programme.
Lessons on respect for human rights, community policing and public relations as well as customer care, have been included in the harmonized curriculum.
Furthermore, AP officers have been allowed to perform traffic duties in a move taken by immediate former Inspector General Joseph Boinnet.
Until last August, when the traffic department was disbanded and functions decentralized to the counties, the department was a semi-autonomous formation of Kenya Police with its own officers answerable to base commanders all the way to the traffic commandant.
Any officer can now be deployed to do traffic duties, ending an era when only a few cops were selected to serve in the traffic department often considered a lucrative station for making quick money.
In new guidelines introduced by Boinnet, all traffic matters are handled by Officer Commanding Stations (OCSs) who decide on whom to deploy to traffic duties.
Among functions of the traffic officers include prevention of accidents, investigation of accidents, enforcement of all rules and regulations pertaining to traffic matters.
Most officers desire to perform traffic duties. Some even induce superiors to be deployed on the roads where they can solicit bribes from motorcyclists, public service vehicle (PSV) operators, trucks drivers, and private motorists.
The traffic department is notorious for corruption.
Several attempts to address the problem including changes at the top have borne little results - the traffic cops continue taking bribes thereby maintaining a top spot on Transparency International (TI) graft index.
Though NPSC and NPS did not provide figures, more than 20 officers have either committed suicide or homicide in the last one year.