CHURCH LATEST

The Church has accused the government of breach of confidence for revealing deliberations of last week’s meeting to the media, and castigating its No position on the draft constitution at various political rallies.

The National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) said Monday it had lost faith in the talks that were meant to iron out sticky issues standing in the way of a new constitution.

The talks were also aimed at reaching consensus before the referendum scheduled for July.

In particular, NCCK secretary general Rev Peter Karanja said Justice minister Mutula Kilonzo had expressed “a blatant and incorrect insinuation that the Church may change its position without amendments being made to the draft.”

“We wish to put the point straight that our position is No, unless the draft constitution is amended,” he said at a press conference in Nairobi.

Rev Karanja, who was flanked by 26 other church leaders, therefore demanded that Mr Kilonzo retracts the sentiments he expressed before any meaningful deliberations take place.

“We also want the government representatives to refrain from strategically and prematurely leaking to the media details in these negotiations.”

The Church objects to the section of Article 26 of the draft constitution which empowers doctors to end a pregnancy if it endangers the woman’s life or she needs emergency treatment.

The leaders are also opposed to the retention of kadhis’ courts in the proposed Constitution under Article 169 and 170, which limit their authority to disputes over personal status, marriage, divorce or inheritance, where all the parties are Muslims and agree to take the case to a Kadhi.

During the meeting between the two parties, Mr Kilonzo is reported to have pointed out that the clause the clergy were complaining about in the proposed constitution already exists in the penal code.

Mr Kilonzo and Lands minister James Orengo said that the proposed constitution had made it even harder to procure an abortion than the current law, because it expressly states that abortion is not permitted.

“It had also elevated the provision from the penal code to the constitution,” he said then.

But Rev Karanja said that such a provision did not in any way make the church to tone down its No campaign against the draft.

“For avoidance of doubt, we here state that if the cardinal issues raised by the church are not addressed before the referendum, our members remain mobilised to vote No,” he said.

However, the leaders said they will not boycott meetings of the committee and nominated five representatives for the talks.

They are: Bishop Philip Sulumeti (Catholic Church), Rev Willy Mutiso (Evangelical), Bishop Gerry Kibarabara (Gospel Assemblies).

Others Bishop David Oginge of Christ Is the Answer and Rev Charles Kibicho of the NCCK.

“We take these efforts of the two principals in good faith and believe they can unlock the deadlocks so that the nation can have an un-contested referendum,” he added.

They also ruled out amendment of the new constitution after the referendum, saying what should be done then can as well be done now.

“Its not like there will be new people from the moon coming to write the clauses afresh,” Rev Karanja said.

They also asked the civil society to cooperate with the Church.

But the latter has since stated that the formed committee was not an organ of review under the law, and they would therefore not recognise it.