50 SDA churches ditch faith for breakaway Nairobi Cosmopolitan Conference

At least 50 Seventh-Day Adventist churches in Kisii’s Gosere area in South Mugirango have abandoned the mainstream church leadership for the controversial Nairobi Cosmopolitan Conference (NCC).

Church Elders who spoke to journalists at Ikoba in Tabaka said the move to ditch the church's formally recognised South Kenya Conference leadership was sparked by its failure to address challenges affecting them.

They described the journey with South Kenya Conference as ‘windy and torturous’.

The church elder's chairman Alloys Mokono said the Gosere SDA Churches had patiently borne ill treatment from SKC for more than four years.

“We have soldiered on amid the trails but today we have made a united decision that is time to move on to where we can find rest which is the Nairobi Cosmopolitan Conference,” he said.

In 2019, the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists sued the Nairobi Cosmopolitan Conference over the use of the Adventist name, trademark and logo.

The global church leadership asked the High court to have NCC be stopped from operating as a religious entity. The GC argued that NCC was registered as a private company.

The GC claims only the Adventist denomination had exclusive rights to the name Seventh-day Adventist.

NCC was created following a leadership dispute between two factions at the Central Kenya Conference in 2015.

On Saturday, however, the elders from Gosere said the decision to join NCC has not made members non-Seventh Day Adventists.

“We what to tell the world that we are still loyal members of the Seventh Day Adventist Church and we dispel the false narratives being spread that we have ditched the faith,” Mokono said.

The elders told  South Kenya conference leaders to stop aggression against them especially using the authorities.

“We acquired the land legally and we built the churches without your input, we own them and it shall remain so," Mokono added.

The move by churches in Kisii is the first after others from Transmara region also jumped ship.