Who gave the police the responsibility to abandon the criminal procedure as we know it? Who authorised the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) to substitute the law with fear, procedure with brute force, and the Constitution with terror? In a functioning democracy, law enforcement follows the law. In a failing one, it manufactures its own law. Kenya today stands dangerously close to the latter. It used to be that when the police suspected someone of a crime, they issued a summon. The individual was asked to report to the nearest police station to record a statement.
That simple step, an embodiment of due process, has been replaced by a chilling routine: Masked or plainclothes officers in unmarked vehicles, often armed, storming residential estates, bundling individuals into cars without identification, and disappearing them for hours or days without informing their families or legal representatives. What we are witnessing is not the evolution of law enforcement. It is the devolution into tyranny.
The Constitution is clear. Article 49 outlines the rights of arrested persons, including the right to be informed promptly, in a language they understand, of the reason for their arrest, the right to communicate with an advocate, and the right to be brought before a court within 24 hours. What the DCI is doing violates every single one of these protections. These are not arrests. They are abductions. And abductions are not part of any legitimate policing. They are the hallmarks of police states, of juntas and despots, of regimes that have lost both their legitimacy and their moral compass.
Let us be honest: The use of force, disguise, and night-time raids are not tactics of a lawful state. They are tactics of fear. And fear is the weapon of tyrants. The Kenya Police Service, particularly the DCI, has become an instrument of repression under the guise of criminal justice. Those who defend these actions claim the need for national security or the urgency to combat crime. But security that abandons the law is not security. It is impunity. And a government that fights crime by committing crimes loses its legitimacy in the eyes of the people.
We have reached a point where ordinary Kenyans cannot differentiate between legitimate police work and criminal kidnapping. That is the tragedy. That is the danger. Once the line between law enforcement and criminality is blurred, citizens are left defenceless, with no way of telling whether the person banging at their door at 2am. is a rogue officer or a robber pretending to be one. This erosion of legal certainty destroys public trust in policing and opens the floodgates to lawlessness from all sides.
More disturbing is the normalisation of this terror. As a society, we are beginning to treat abductions as part of life. The media calls them “arrests” without question. Government spokespeople brush them off as necessary. But state terror begins with silence. When we fail to call these abductions for what they are, we participate in the erosion of our own freedoms. When we shrug at the sight of unmarked vehicles snatching young people from the streets for participating in protests, we betray the Constitution we swore to uphold.
Let us also not pretend this is happening in a vacuum. These abductions are often political. They target critics of the regime, outspoken citizens, protestors, and those demanding accountability. It is no coincidence that the same state that has failed to provide jobs, cut the cost of living, or deliver justice is now deploying force to suppress those who dare to speak out. This is not about crime prevention. It is about power preservation.
The criminal justice system is not broken because the Constitution is inadequate. It is broken because those entrusted with its implementation have become its greatest enemies. We do not lack laws. We lack courage and accountability. DCI is not above the law. It is a creature of the law. When it steps outside that boundary, it becomes an agent of oppression.
The President and his Interior Ministry must take full responsibility. They must rein in rogue officers, disband covert arrest squads, and publicly reaffirm the supremacy of the Constitution. If they don’t, they risk taking Kenya down a dark, irreversible path.
By Justin Muturi