Amin Moves Dozens of Officers, Names Former Flying Squad Boss Saidi Kiprotich ATPU Boss

Dozens of senior DCI officers were moved in changes announced by Director Mohamed Amin.

Among others, Amin named the former boss of the defunct Flying Squad and Special Crimes Prevention Unit Saidi Kiprotich as the new director of the Anti Terrorism Police Unit (ATPU).

Until his appointment to the position, Kiprotich was the director of operations at the Directorate of Criminal Investigations headquarters.

He took over from Johnstone Kola who has retired from the service after attaining the retirement age.

The announcement was made on November 1.

In the changes, Amin named Richard Mwaura as the acting director of operations at the DCI.

He also moved dozens of senior officers who had stayed in one station for more than three years.

This follows a new directive that all those who had served in a particular for at least three years be moved for their well-being and better service delivery.

Kiprotich once served as the director of operations Nairobi Regional Command before he was moved to the DCI in the same capacity.

He had also served as the county commander for Taita Taveta and at the defunct Flying Squad and Special Crimes Prevention Unit.

ATPU is one of the elite units in the National Police Service and is mandated to mitigate and investigate terrorism-related cases in the country.

It was formed in 2003 as a unit to investigate all terrorism matters.

This was after several terror attacks were experienced in the country for example U.S Embassy (1998) and the Kikambala (2002) terror attacks.

And since then, the team has managed to detect and contain dozens of planned terror-related attacks.

For instance, among others, ATPU works with the National Counter-Terrorism Centre to deal with research and radicalisation of the youth to deter them from joining the Somali-based al Shabaab militants.

Multi-agency teams are involved in various operations that have seen them thwart dozens of planned terror attacks.