Yes, you can put the footer anywhere you want. The easiest way is to set cloneToTop parameter in in the language js file.

From jqGrid navigator online documentation
http://www.trirand.com/jqgridwiki/doku.php?id=wiki:navigator

Here’s a post on how to remove unwanted actions from navigator
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3552855/add-toolbar-in-the-bottom-of-the-header-using-jqgrid/3557663#3557663

The easiest way with the second approach is to create a separate js file and include that at the bottom of the page in which the grid is displayed.