• Clerics complained about being summoned and interrogated without decorum
• They want to be left to self-regulate, said they can 'identify the rot amongst ourselves'
Image: KURGAT MARINDANY.
Twenty-one church bishops, pastors and other clerics in Kajiado county have called on the government to go slow on them.
“Why are we being summoned by assistant chiefs, assistant county commissioners and county commissioners to state who we are?” Dr Daniel Maada asked.
He was accompanied by bishops Philip Tima (chair pastors fellowship), Michael Mwasya (secretary pastors fellowship), Dr Josephat Njoroge, Joseph Kamua and Regina Wandai.
They told the government to tell their chiefs and other senior provincial administrators to treat them with decorum when trying to establish their documentation.
The leaders also asked Interior CS Kindiki Kithure to devolve all the registration offices to the counties from Nairobi to make their work easy in filing their returns.
“As the churches in Kenya, we can regulate ourselves and do not need the state to govern us. We can identify the rot amongst ourselves,” Maada said.
Bishop Njoroge said the government should not put all the pastors and bishops in one bag with people like Pr Paul Mackenzie, whom he said ceased serving the Lord in 2019.
Njoroge said the government should be seeking the support of the church leadership in seeking cult organisations among the people instead of using chiefs to harass them.
Kamau said Mackenzie should fight his wars and asked the government to allow the churches in the country to use Huduma outlets across the country in filing their returns instead of requiring them to report to Nairobi.
Kamau said most churches in the country are non-profitable organisations and have no returns to make to the state because theirs is service oriented to the Christians and they have no other businesses.
Bishop Tima said those chiefs sent by the state to look into their documentation and registrations cannot understand them.
“The level of education we undertook to be where we are cannot be understood by chiefs. It is complicated,” Bishop Tima said.
“For me being accorded the rank of a bishop means my level of education can be complicated to those picked to censor us.”