NAIROBI, Kenya Dec 4 – Lieutenant General J. K. Tuwei has been appointed Commander of the Kenya Army. He was promoted by President Mwai Kibaki, the Commander-in-Chief, in a major armed forces reshuffle announced on Thursday.
Lt Gen Tuwei, formerly Commandant at the National Defence College, replaces Lieutenant General A.S.K. Njoroge who has been deployed to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as an Ambassador.
Replacing Lt Gen Tuwei at the National Defence College is Lt. Gen J. M. Mutwii.
The changes were listed in a statement by the Presidential Press Service which also named Major General N. Mwaniki as the new Deputy Army Commander.
Brigadier M. O. Oyugi has been promoted to Major General and appointed General Officer Commanding Eastern Command. He replaces Major General J. Kasaon who moves to National Defence College as Directing Staff.
Major General P. J. Opiyo has been appointed Assistant Chief of General Staff in charge of Operations, Planning, Doctrine and Training at Defence Headquarters.
Major General E. M. Sasia has been appointed Assistant Chief of General Staff in Charge of Personnel and Logistics at Defence Headquarters.
Lt Gen Tuwei is a long serving army official. He joined the Kenya Armed Forces as an Army Cadet in April 1973. Six years later he was promoted to the rank of Captain and was appointed as Battalion Signals Officer and thereafter served in the same unit as a Company Commander.
In 1982, he was then transferred to the Kenya Air Force. There he served as a Staff Officer at the Transport Air Base.
There too, he made his rise through the ranks and in 1990, he was promoted to Colonel and appointed the Commander of Moi Air Base. Two years later he would bear the title Brigadier.
He returned to the Kenya Army in 1995 and served in various capacities until the 2002 appointment as Commandant Armed Forces Training College. Three years he was promoted to the rank of Commandant National Defence College.
Lieutenant General Tuwei, is a graduate of Royal College of Defence Studies, United Kingdom.
Lt Gen Augustino Stephen Karanu (A. S. K) Njoroge joined the Kenya Army in 1970. After six years of infantry duties with the 5th Battalion, he was then posted to Signal Battalion where he trained as a Communications Officer.
He has had distinguished military career rising from an Infantry unit Commanding Officer to Commander of the Kenya Army (2005) and has served in all the in-between’s: Defense Advisor in Tanzania and Senior Staff Officer at the Defence and Army Headquarters.
Lt Karanu was at one time Kenya’s Senior National Representative in the Global war on terrorism, one of the many positions that propelled him to deputy Army Commander in 2003.
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