Hardly a month after the Inspector-General of Police Hillary Mutyambai ordered traffic officers to stop erecting road blocks or conducting traffic checks on highways without their seniors’ permission, than some illegal stops have started coming up. Looks, like hunger is already biting. Some of these corrupt police were used to so much bribe that they could afford lavish lifestyle and buy expensive cars live in big houses which could not match their know meager salary earnings. Some of them are getting desperate and devising ways to continue extorting money under their seniors radar. According to a traffic police who revealed this trick, some of the police are getting so desperate since so many them can no longer fund the lavish lifestyle including paying rent for the expensive houses they have been living in courtesy of the bribes. If you use the busy Nairobi - Makutano - Embu - Meru road, between 6.30 am and 11.30 am, you will see about 8 to 18 stops on the road.Not all are legal.They will park their private cars on the side of the road since this is a mobile operation. These police will not be having the normal traffic barricade and one or two will have a stop sign. Moreover, they will have 2 or 3 motorbikes stationed on the stop to pursue those who wont stop when prompted.It gets easy, stop, pay and go. The wont bother with private cars since they do not want to compromise their illegal affair. After an hour of collecting bribes (especially from the Mogoka and Miraa drivers and matatus), they get into their cars and move to another location and continue.By midday you will not see any of these stops. They do this owing to the fact that some of the drivers are ignorant and do not know the legal/known gazetted stops. These officers are so daring that they use all sorts of intimidation and extortion to get their bribes. Should you refuse to bribe them, they are armed with notice to attend court and will fine you with all sorts of offences. Moreover, they will collude with the court officials to have you heavily penalized. This ingenious method is slowly moving to other towns where the traffic police heavily benefited from such stops, such as Kisumu and some areas in Uasin Gishu and Marakwet can continue benefiting from the loot.
It will take the public with the help of the offcice of the IG to tame this trend.The IG should provide the known gazetted stops and let the public know of the legal police stops. Be keen and share.
NB
Usisumbue na efidense, this is undercover operation under investigation