The country has however had its share of internal security challenges, and the government is not willing to gamble with the safety of its citizens.
This can be attributed to the move by Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery to map out three major issues he wants security agencies to focus on, in 2016.
“The first interest is the safety of the citizens and their property,” he said.
To safeguard citizens and their belongings, 2016 security priorities will be the war on terror, radicalization of youths and cattle rustling.
He made the declaration on Thursday when he led a major security meeting at the Kenya School of Government, attended by all senior security chiefs in the country.
On terror, he said “it will be our priority number one.”
He said there will be high engagement among all security agencies saying all actions will be informed by intelligence gathered.
On this, he said the Directorate of Criminal Investigations and the National Intelligence Service will have a major role of gathering intelligence and providing it on time, for a quick response to thwart any terror related security threats.
“Our intelligence agencies will be providing us with the information on this,” he said. “We plan, understand and know how to tackle it.”
On radicalization, security chiefs will be tasked with identifying the key factors promoting radicalization in their regions.
“You need to understand in your area of responsibility, the radicalization process,” he said.
Specifically, he wants the county commissioners, county commanders and regional coordinators to know, “how they get their ideology, the process of radicalization and how they are introduced to violent extremism.”
The CS however urged them to involve all stakeholders including political and religious leaders.
“We need to work out that process. We can actually put a strategy at the county levels on how to fight this,” he proposed.
On cattle rustling, he said already there have been significant gains such that, “the Pokot and Turkana having a ceremony together. We must exploit that. It’s a big achievement.”
The war on cattle rustling will be concentrated in Baragoi, Meru and Isiolo, where he said “we still have some problems.”