 I now take this opportunity for ICDF sir to welcome you so that you can launch this exercise official. Welcome sir. The Deputy Amir Commander, Assistant Chief of the Defence Forces of Nial and the Precepts, the Director of Medical Services, Defence Headquarters, Deputy Commanders of the Kenyanya Force and the Kenyanya Army, the Chief Recruiting Officer, members of the Forestry, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, good morning again. On behalf of the Minister of Defence, the Chief of the Defence Forces and the Kenyanya Defence Forces Fraternity, I welcome you to this media briefing that marks the form of launch of Year 2023 and the Defence Forces National Goodman Drive. Today is a culmination of an elaborate process of public participation that began on 30th July when MOD advertised KDF recruitment through various media platforms. To put this exercise into context, recruitment of diverse colours into KDF is necessitated by human resource and capacity gaps in the establishment and the need for continuous alignment with the defence and security environment. In this regard, KDF seeks to recruit qualified Kenyans in three broad categories. These are officer cadets, recruits and the Defence Forces Constabulary. Officer cadets represent those who will ultimately be commissioned as officers of the Kenyanya Defence Forces. These categories comprises General Service Officer Cadets, Graduate General Service Officer Cadets and Specialist Officer Cadets. Under the recruits category, when visioned to recruit, the general duty recruits among them artisans or tradesmen and women, who will be classified as service members upon completion of basic military training. The third category consists of Defence Forces Constables who will be drawn from ex-KDF Service Members and ex-National News Service Uniformed Personnel. Ladies and gentlemen, their advertisement for the ongoing recruitment cycle has to date been in circulation for at least 30 days and hence attained country-wide reach. That's an optimum participation by interested applicants. In this regard, KDF has mapped out 374 recruitment centres across the 47 counties of this country. As such, recruitment teams will interview candidates at designated venues from today, 28 August to 8 September 2023, running from 8 to 5 p.m. Therefore, this media briefing aims to symbolically launch the commencement of in-person interviews at various recruitment centres nationwide beginning this morning. Father, I wish to state that Sunday, 20 August 2023, marked the last day for specialist officer cadets and tradesmen and women to submit applications through the LOD online portal. At the moment, shortlisting of candidates in the two categories is ongoing and those whose applications conform to the specified parameters and are selected will be informed through print media between 17 and 24 September 2023. However, shortlisting is only the first step in the process, considering that physical verification of documents and medical examination based on military benchmarks shall be conducted thereafter. Upon completion of each day's activities, successful candidates at each recruitment centre will be notified immediately and issued with calling letters, which among others inform the date and place where the candidate shall report for further processing. The venues shall be the Kenya Military Academy at Lanets-Lakuni County for the potential cadets and the Kenya Defence Forces Recruits Training School in Elbride was in the issue county for general duty recruits as well as tradesmen and women. To this end, the Ministry of Defence is committed to deliver a transparent and accountable exercise. In this regard, any person purporting to have influence to recruit a potential candidate outside of the designated recruitment centres or mechanisms stated in this briefing must be avoided. Members of the public are advised to assist but from fraud-sensitive violence KBF values more so the value of integrity. In support of this, oversight measures have been put in place encompassing use of intelligence operatives, anti-corruption of field officers and the media. More importantly, we request 1MG in exercise of their patriotic mandate to volunteer information on any suspicious activities by reporting to the recruiting teams on the ground or in the alternative, mobile phone numbers 0726419709 or 0726419706. To the candidates aspiring to join KBF, please be mindful that this is not a job, it is a calling. Indeed, every single day the men and women in uniform renew their commitment to serve humanity and this is the conscious choice you are just about to make. We assure you, it is a worthwhile undertaking and I welcome all willing potential candidates to present themselves for recruitment. Ladies and gentlemen, with those remarks, it is my honour and duty to declare Year 2023 Can the French forces recruitment drive formally launched a centenary summit? Thank you so much, I think we can take a round of the meeting but our meeting is clear and distant. Yes sir. Very good. Assisting you there. Right. My name is Koizubo, I am an inspector. I have been in the group for three years and I am the second member of the group. I have been in the group for three years and I am the second member of the group. Thank you very much. Thank you sir. One question on the oversight to ensure that there are no cases of irregularities because it is not the first time we have been given the assurance. What specific measures are you going to take this time round to be able to curb this vice? We understand that even before the exercise commenced, these cases, are there any cases that we are investigating or maybe one that involves even military officers, maybe the ones that you are already investigating? My name is Emma Stetscher from the Sky News Group. I am interested to know the Shona communities and those other communities that are recognized as part of Kenyan tribes. Are they going to be incorporated in the reserve group? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much for those questions. The first point is that I think that number is not disclosed and no military will ever disclose to you for security reasons. So I think that number is left to the leadership to be able to manage. But the recruitment we are going to do. Now the mobile number, the second one, let me say one of them. The first one is 0726419709. The second one is 0726419706. The next question is by Mr. Gattete. He is asking about the oversight measures. Yes, we have a raft of them as I have mentioned. And the 192 was a very, very important role apart from the official manager, the oversight officials. But we have had since 2017 around 80 cases of fraud. And many of these have been investigated. On the whole side, we've had 56 cases of being fined and given. Others are still ongoing because you remember how we call this a very complex area. It's a crime. And crime takes a lot of time to be spent. But internally we are as efficient as we could. The other question is about the Shona community. I think the requirements are very, very clear. But you need to come with your ID card. You need to bring with you all those that are not here in your academic credentials. If you come that you have been declared a citizen of Kenya, we are going to be in a problem. Thank you. I'm not around in the agenda yet. I'm going back to corruption. I think before this exercise, the president had already also raised an alarm regarding those who are likely to influence all other types of dealings in the United States. As a military, I know you are one of the plurals. And right now you are breaking on this exercise. Maybe you are able to, can you report if at all there's any case that will be intercepted now that the exercise is beginning today? Because we understand a lot may be happening underground that civilians may not be in the know. So you as the military chief or bosses, are you keen to or have you intercepted any code or anything in relation to this exercise? Like somebody trying to exchange money so that they can stay true to us. Thank you. I think as of now, Mr. Wen, nothing will be reported as of this morning. But in the preceding weeks, we will let people come to the gate that nobody has been recruited but all from. In those cases have been reported to the police when they have been arrested, mostly involving civilians. But as of this morning, not yet. If we do, we are going to work on that very efficiently. Yes, another? Thank you. My name is Mike. Sorry, from TV 47. You said this is a very serious process. Are people with disabilities going to be cruel entities or something like that? We are leading it to as well. I think that is one final, one final piece. I know that you have to take the two. Good morning. My name is Gabriel. This is a concern by potential hypocrites about them having a challenge of accessing certificate of good conduct from DCI. I think they are going to be considered to many of them who may show up in the printing centers without certificate of good conduct. Thank you. The first question is about disability. I think the criteria is very clear of who is going to be recruited. I must also say that no human being is perfect. We all have certain kinds of disabilities. So if you expect to get a perfect human being, perhaps you will not be able to get them here. The thing is that this process is greatly competitive. I don't understand better than the next one. But I must also say that we are one of the organizations that have a very, very comprehensive hero system for taking care of people who are differently able. And our experience in operations, right from the Schiffer campaign and more recently to what we are doing in terms of counter-terrorism operations just taught us a lot and we have very, very elaborate infrastructure so that everybody can be able to make a contribution depending on their ability to make that contribution. So I think there is room for improvement. Thank you. I think this marks the end of this exercise. President Sark, I thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. We forgot a question about Mr. Kemeny. I'm sorry about that, Mr. Kemeny. We did not mean to annoy you. But he's asked about whether the candidates reporting the recruitment centers and if they don't have the certificate of good conduct, whether or not they will be admitted. I think there's no requirement for that. If you come with it when I'm good, and as I said previously we have a mechanism of knowing whether or not you have been involved in crime. So I don't think that's the issue. If you don't have one, just come. We sought you out in due time. Thank you very much.