Wealthy Kenyan businessman and ex-lawmaker Harun Mwau wins court fight over police hiring

Kenyan tycoon and former lawmaker John Harun Mwau has won a year-long legal fight over who controls the hiring of the country's police officers, after the Court of Appeal threw out challenges to a ruling that stripped the National Police Service Commission of the power to recruit constables.

A three-judge bench of Justices Patrick Kiage, Jamila Mohammed and Jessie Lesiit on Friday, Oct. 16, dismissed consolidated appeals filed by the commission and the Law Society of Kenya against an Employment and Labour Relations Court judgment delivered on Oct. 30, 2025.

"Ultimately, we find the consolidated appeal before us to be without merit and they are accordingly dismissed in entirety," the judges said. Citing the public interest in the dispute, they ordered each party to bear its own costs.

The decision leaves in place the lower court's finding that recruitment and related personnel matters for uniformed officers fall under the independent command of the Inspector-General of Police, not the commission, a civilian body created under Kenya's 2010 Constitution.

How the case began

Mwau, 78, challenged the exercise in court after the commission advertised police constable vacancies on Sept. 19 and gazetted new recruitment rules, the National Police Service Commission (Recruitment and Appointment) Regulations, 2025, published as Legal Notice No. 159 of 2025.

The former Kilome MP argued that the Constitution does not give the commission power to recruit uniformed officers and that the job belongs to the National Police Service itself. He relied on Articles 239 and 246 of the Constitution and argued that recruitment by the commission would undermine the Inspector-General's independent command. His petition forced the postponement of the national recruitment drive.

Justice Hellen Wasilwa agreed with him on Oct. 30, 2025. She ruled that the commission lacked constitutional authority to recruit and appoint constables, barred it from running the exercise and declared both the September advertisement and the regulations unconstitutional.

The commission and the Law Society appealed. They argued that Article 246 gives the commission broad human resource powers, including the recruitment of uniformed officers, and that the Inspector-General's independent command under Article 245 concerns mainly operational matters. In February, the Court of Appeal temporarily suspended parts of Wasilwa's judgment dealing with the Inspector-General's authority over promotions and dismissals while the appeals were pending.

What the judges said

The appellate bench said the Constitution draws a clear line between uniformed officers and civilian staff. It held that the commission's mandate under Article 246(3) covers civilian staff of the police service, not sworn officers, and said it saw "no ambiguity" on the point. The judges also found that the commission is not a national security organ under Article 239.

On the Inspector-General's independence, the court said: "No person, not even the Cabinet Secretary, and thus less still the Commission, may give him a direction." It added that it would be "ironic" for the Inspector-General to command and be held accountable for officers he does not hire.

The judges rejected the argument that limiting the commission's role would open the door to abuses of the past, describing it as a "throwback to the old dark days of unaccountability, impunity and political suppression." They said the Inspector-General remains bound by the Constitution's provisions on human rights and the rule of law.

Inspector-General Douglas Kanja welcomed the judgment. "The constitutional order has been vindicated," he said.

Who is Harun Mwau

Mwau joined the Kenya Police through Kiganjo Police College in 1968 and represented Kenya in shooting at the 1968 Mexico City and 1972 Munich Olympics. He later left the force for business and built interests in security services, real estate and logistics. He served as the first director of the now-defunct Kenya Anti-Corruption Authority from 1997 until a tribunal found him unfit for the office in 1999. He founded the Party of Independent Candidates of Kenya, ran for president in 1992, and won the Kilome parliamentary seat in the 2007 election, later serving as an assistant minister for transport under President Mwai Kibaki.

In June 2011, the U.S. government designated Mwau a narcotics kingpin under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, a move that freezes any U.S. assets and bars Americans from doing business with him. He strongly denied the allegations, saying he had "never been involved and has never contemplated or even dreamed of being involved in trafficking narcotic drugs," and sued the then U.S. ambassador, Michael Ranneberger, in Kenya's High Court. In November 2011, Internal Security assistant minister Orwa Ojodeh told Parliament that police investigations had found "no evidence" linking Mwau to the drug trade. He has never been charged in Kenya.