About 280 people have been protected as witnesses by the Witness Protection Agency Kenya.
This has been the case despite the agency facing various financial constraints.
The number of the witnesses protected by the agency is part of the 780 applications they have received since its inception three years ago.
Speaking in Kisumu on Wednesday, the agency’s Chief Executive Alice Ondieki said out of the applications they received, not all people needed witness protection as others apply to enjoy various luxuries that come with the protection.
The Chief Executive said in most cases that do not apply to them, they refer to relevant departments like to the Gender Commission among others and those who don’t meet their witness protection criteria are also not chosen for protection.
Ondieki said in cases where they find people to be lying they refer them to the police for actions to be taken.
She said they also relocate witnesses and provide them with the same life they were living before relocation giving an example of relocating witnesses from Mpeketoni due to the dangerous zone.
Ondieki said as a unit, they face various challenges with the people being given protection and are sometimes forced to remove them from the unit for breaking various regulations put in place.
“We have a case where we discharged someone two weeks ago, who went and started impersonating a police man by filling the P3 forms for people, he was caught with the forms and a police uniform and currently his case being handled by the police and he will be charged in court," she said.
Ondieki said in other cases, the witnesses break the memorandum they had with the agency by contacting the families as others add more wives due to the luxurious life they are leaving and the good packages they receive, “she said.
“Other challenges include slow pace in which cases are concluded which have taken up the matter with the chief registrar to come up with rules that will allow such cases be heard on a daily basis,” Ondieki added.
The director said despite the financial constraints they are having, they have the capacity to protect witnesses and currently they have recruited 73 staffs.
Ondieki said in this financial year they were allocated Sh379 million from the initial allocation they requested of Sh670 million for devolution of services and recruiting new staffs.
Currently the agency has officers in Kisumu, Coast and Nairobi ad are yet to devolve to North and South Rift and to Central Kenya.