High crime rates and the inability of public security services to provide adequate protection are the main factors driving the expansion of private security in Kenya. This report, published by the University of Wales, provides an overview of the private security sector in Kenya, its relationship to public policing and key challenges facing the sector. Development of an effective private security sector requires a regulatory framework that establishes licensing and monitoring standards and takes steps to improve the safety of security guards.
The rise in crime and growth of the private security sector in Kenya are connected to the erosion of state capacities and services that began in the late 1980s and continued throughout the 1990s. During this period of economic decline, state expenditure and investment were reduced. The ability of government and municipal institutions to deliver law and order services deteriorated; corruption and fiscal mismanagement continued unabated. As a result, crime and levels of insecurity rose sharply, particularly in the capital of Nairobi. This increasingly criminalised environment has led to the expansion of the private security sector, one of the fastest growing sectors of the Kenyan economy.
The exact number of private security companies in Kenya is unknown; estimates vary from 400 to 2000. The majority are small to medium-sized, owner-managed and employ less than 100 people. Other factors defining the sector are:
- Most companies provide guarding and some use of technology. Large companies offer integrated security solutions; small companies offer only manned guarding. Clients include industries, banks, government agencies, embassies, international organisations and refugee camps.
- There are no special government regulations for registration, licensing and employee quality control. A draft Bill to regulate the sector exists, but has not gone to Parliament.
- The sector employs approximately 48,000 people. There are no formal requirements for guard training and vetting; quality of training varies widely.
- Guarding is notoriously low-paid and dangerous. Many guards work 12-hour days; many companies offer no overtime, annual leave, insurance or social benefits. Guards are by law unarmed and often face a generally armed criminal element.
- Two industry associations exist, and there is considerable competition between these associations regarding issues of regulation and pay.
- Absent a formalised regulatory structure, private security and police cooperation depends on personal relationships among security companies, police officials and local police commanders.
Kenya needs to develop a regulatory framework for licensing and monitoring of its private security sector. Issues to consider in constructing such a framework include:
- a system of vetting and registratration of companies and guards;
- the level of training of guards;
- whether and how regulation would exacerbate divisions within the sector;
- how a more formal relationship between private security and police could act as a ‘force multiplier’ and increase security for all sections of society; and
- how current low wages in the private security sector contribute to poverty and crime and make guards more likely to become sources of insecurity rather than providers of security.
