Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka has given the National Police Service Commission (NPSC), Teachers Service Commission (TSC) and Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) seven days to disclose details of their recruitment over the past five years.
Kalonzo wants the institutions to reveal the number of people recruited, the criteria used, and the regions from which successful applicants were selected.
The former Vice President said the demand was aimed at establishing whether recruitment into key public institutions was being conducted fairly and in line with constitutional principles.
“Seven days. That is what I am giving the National Police Service Commission, the Teachers Service Commission and the Kenya Defence Forces to come clean on who they have recruited over the last five years, how many, on what basis, and from where in this country,” Kalonzo said in a statement issued on Thursday.
He said concerns raised by National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula and Murang’a Woman Representative Betty Maina over the alleged issuance of TSC recruitment letters through unofficial channels should not be dismissed as political rhetoric.
“You cannot dismiss what National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula and Murang’a Woman Representative Betty Maina have said about TSC recruitment letters as just political noise,” he said.
According to Kalonzo, the allegations require proper scrutiny because they touch on the independence of public institutions and the principle of merit in recruitment.
“When the Speaker of the National Assembly says something like this in public, it stops being gossip. It becomes a matter that this country must get to the bottom of,” he said.
Kalonzo alleged that the government was allowing political considerations to influence recruitment, saying employment opportunities in some public institutions were increasingly being determined by political connections rather than merit.
“We have been getting information for months that recruitment into these institutions has stopped reflecting who we are as a country, and that where a job comes from now depends less on merit and more on who you know or who you voted for,” he said.
He invoked Article 232 of the Constitution, which sets out values and principles of public service, including fair competition and merit as the basis of appointments and promotions.
“These institutions belong to Kenyans. They are not a basket of favours to dish out to friends and reward loyalty,” Kalonzo said.
He said his MPs and lawyers had been instructed to write to the three institutions within 48 hours seeking the recruitment data.
He said the requests would be anchored on laws granting citizens access to information held by public bodies.
“The seven-day clock starts from when those letters land on their desks,” Kalonzo said.
He warned that failure to provide the information would prompt legal action, including seeking court orders compelling the institutions to disclose the records.
“If they choose silence instead of answers, we will go to court and ask a judge to compel them to disclose what they are hiding,” he said.
Kalonzo said the move was not intended as a political threat but as an accountability measure.
“Kenyans will get the truth about who is being hired into their institutions, and why, with or without State House’s cooperation,” he said.
