The Witness Protection Agency has decried underfunding.
The agency said it was given limited funds to carry out its mandate effectively, which includes ensuring that witnesses across the country are not exposed to danger over the information they have.
Speaking during a workshop with Mombasa based journalists on Thursday, the agency’s director Alice Ondieki, said the agency was allocated a budget of 379 million shillings against their application of 680 million shillings.
“We deal with up to 300 witnesses that we have to protect per year and some have to be compensated for time lost, since some are relocated from their original places and that requires a lot of money,” said Ondieki.
The agency also noted that at times they are forced to relocate witnesses under threat outside the country in order to ensure their safety.
“Among the cases we deal with include terrorism, murder, and organized crimes. Some of these cases are linked to high profiled people and hence we have to be thorough in our protection course,” said Mrs Ondieki.
Mombasa is ranked second in the number of individuals under the protection programme with a majority of them being tied to terrorism cases.