Murkomen Plots Investigating Students Who Have Been In University Forever
The CS suggested investigating students who have overstayed their time in university to the point of changing courses to extend their stay and find themselves participating in controversial vices.
Viral Tea Ke Writer 
Interior Cabinet Secretary (CS) Kipchumba Murkomen on Thursday, February 13 opened up on cases of wealthy university students delaying graduating from campus and entering the job market.
Speaking during the launch of the report on the Status of Drug and Substance Abuse in Universities in Kenya by the National Authority for the Campaign against Drug and Alcohol Abuse (NACADA), Murkomen claimed that the students amassed huge influence and were not participating in any form of business, raising questions regarding their source of income.
The CS suggested investigating students who have overstayed their time in university to the point of changing courses to extend their stay and find themselves participating in controversial vices.
A collage of public universities in Kenya. /VIRAL TEA KE
"There have been previously notorious students who have never finished school and they are very rich, doing no business and are extremely influential and are in the student leadership. So you have that line of students, we must be able to investigate why a student is not leaving school...pretending to finish what course and move to another course sometimes, or delaying their finishing of school," Murkomen narrated.
"In many of these other universities, we must make a deliberate effort to make sure that we deal with those types of students because of the business they are doing around."
His sentiments were in reaction to a report by NACADA on drug and substance abuse showing the prevalence of alcohol among university students, with alcohol consumption reported by 87.3% of students, followed by cigarette use at 64.4% and shisha at 41.2%.
Besides alcohol, students also reported using other substances, including vaping (31%), nicotine pouches (30.7%), kuber (23%), and snuff or chewed tobacco (22.1%).
“IG, we need to strengthen all the police stations near the universities whether it is Central Police in Nairobi, in Rongai near (Africa) Nazarene University, or the one near Kenyatta University (KU) with deliberate inter-agency efforts within the police to see how we can integrate these investigations,” the CS stated.
Murkomen went on to suggest a wild idea; deploying National Intelligence Service (NIS) officers to universities across the country to address drug and alcohol abuse.
“You know, in the past, we were told, I don’t know, we used to be told that some of the students we saw at the university were not students. We used to be told they were police officers, intelligence officers, they were busy,” he stated.
“Why don’t we go back there IG (Kanja) to make sure that we have intelligence officers working within the university, with the university students, and with police officers? This will help us get proper intelligence and proper intervention in dealing with drugs and drug abuse."
The police chief supported his remarks, announcing that plans were in progress to integrate drug trafficking operations into the Anti-Terrorism Police Unit (ATPU) to enforce stricter measures against drugs. With its extensive resources, the ATPU will enhance efforts to combat drug abuse more effectively.
The survey, conducted in partnership with 17 universities, including private and public ones, involved over 15,000 students across Kenya’s eight administrative regions.
In NACADA's report, 66.4 percent of those surveyed indicated that their friends were the main sources of drugs. If not friends, students also get their drugs from canteen/bar/premises within the neighbourhood at 59.3 percent with fellow students within the institution following suit at 56 percent, findings that outline the influence of social circles in university settings in terms of drug and substance abuse in the country.
Other sources of drugs include online purchasing over websites or social media (39.4%); canteen/bar/premises within the institution (28.0%); support/non-teaching staff (11.4%); and lecturers/teaching staff (7.0%).
