The individual who established an unauthorized police station in Cherus Centre, Kesses sub-county, Collins Leitich Chepkulei, now claims that the base was only five days old and that no police officer had even been assigned to the location.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Leitich also maintained that, contrary to what the media has claimed, he has never posed as a law enforcement official.
It is barely five days old, and neither I nor the cops have impersonated anyone. “The painting is still unfinished,” he remarked.
According to Leitich, the area’s ongoing insecurity occurrences prompted the decision to establish the station.
He continued by saying that villagers had been demanding police presence in the region for a while and that they had chosen to take matters into their own hands because the closest police station was seven kilometers away.
“I made the decision to paint that location, but instead of beginning, I painted it with the people’s assistance—not as me personally, but as a community. That’s because of the insecurity we’re experiencing there,” he stated.
“As a community, we have been experiencing insecurities and we have been requesting assistance from authorities for the police patrol base for the longest time. We are not blaming them because it is possible that they do not have the necessary funds, so we decided as a community why not raise money, with me serving as the financier, to bring the police closer to us.”
Leitich emphasized that before moving forward with the project, he had conferred with local authorities, including representatives of Nyumba Kumi, in order to make his point.
“The community supports me because we stood together during this. Before we began, I had a conversation with the leaders of Nyumba Kumi. We had a meeting, but I don’t want to name people,” he stated.
Leitich also acknowledged that the base’s establishment may not have followed the proper protocols, but he pledged to fix any errors and guarantee the project’s legitimacy.
“I can’t say that I’ve made a mistake or not, but there’s always a process, and you have to follow a few stages before you can go ahead and paint something. We had made some steps, even though they might not have been all of them,” he remarked.
“We are fixing such errors in order to legalize the station, but perhaps we might provide an apology if we have offended the government. Even though we might not have followed the protocol, we will be more methodical moving forward.
