Table Of ContentReligion and Politics in Kenya
Religion and Politics in Kenya
Essays in Honor of a Meddlesome Priest
Edited by
Ben Knighton
religion and politics in kenya
Copyright © Ben Knighton, 2009.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2009 978-0-230-61487-1
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First published in 2009 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States - a division of
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ISBN 978-1-349-37861-6 ISBN 978-0-230-10051-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230100510
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data.
Religion and politics in Kenya : essays in honor of a meddlesome priest.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Christianity and politics–Kenya–History–20th century. 2. Christianity and politics–
Kenya–History–21st century. 3. Religion and politics–Kenya–History–20th century.
4. Religion and politics–Kenya–History–21st century. 5. Gitari, David M.–Political
and social views. 6. Anglican Church of Kenya–History. 7. Kenya–Church history.
8. Kenya–Religion. 9. Kenya–Politics and government–1963-1978. 10. Kenya–Politics and
government–1978-2002. I. Knighton, Ben.
BR1443.K4R45 2009
322’.109676209045–dc22
2009003949
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Macmillan Publishing Solutions.
First edition: September 2009
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Wanja,
Rachel Nyawira, Charis Makena, Joel Munene, and Rosh Murimi
Contents
List of Tables and Figures ix
Preface and Acknowledgments xi
Abbreviations xv
Notes on the Contributors xix
1 Introduction: Strange but Inevitable Bedfellows 1
Ben Knighton
I The Religious Background to Politics in Kenya 55
2 Compromised Critics: Religion in Kenya’s Politics 57
John Lonsdale
3 Faith Engaging Politics: The Preaching of the Kingdom of God 95
Paddy Benson
II The Bishop Meddling in Politics 121
4 “Was There No Naboth to Say No?” Using the
Pulpit in the Struggle for Democracy: The Anglican
Church, Bishop Gitari, and Kenyan Politics 123
Galia Sabar
5 Meddling on to 2008: Is There Any Relevance for
Gitari’s Model in the Aftermath of Ethnic Violence? 143
Julius Gathogo
6 The Church and Islam: VyamaVingi
(Multipartyism) and the Ufungamano Talks 155
John Chesworth
III The Churches’ Involvement in Contemporary Issues 181
7 The NCCK and the Struggle Against
”Ethnic Clashes” in Kenya 183
Jacqueline Klopp
viii Contents
8 Christianity Co-opted 201
Paul Gifford
9 Muingiki Madness 223
Ben Knighton
Bibliography 251
Index 281
List of Tables and Figures
Tables
1.1 Religious Affiliations in Kenya, 1970–2025 41
6.1 Results of the Referendum for Each Province 175
9.1 Market Share of Kenyan National Newspapers 228
Figures
1.1 Bishop Gitari conducting a service of confirmation
and communion at St. Andrew’s Church, Kabare,
on 3 April 1994 15
1.2 President Moi speaking at Kitale stadium at the
enthronement of Bishop Stephen Kewasis
by Archbishop Gitari on 20 July 1997 34
6.1 An Orange rally led by Musyoka Kalonzo, now
Vice-President, at Kapenguria, Transnzoia District,
on 10 October 2005 175
Preface and Acknowledgments
First of all, I must thank all the contributors to this volume, without
whom it would not have been possible. All of them have long experi-
ence of Kenya and have published in the area of this topic before, as
the bibliography bears witness. They have endured my editing with
great fortitude and support. Special thanks are due to John Lonsdale,
who committed himself early to a large contribution and gave me some
very helpful advice. A joint paper by two Kenyans was to have been
included, but given the emotionally disturbing events in their home
country during 2008, it is not surprising that they were not able to
produce their chapter in the end. Between them, the contributors have
set out an intriguing balance of tensions, for each part presents a case
for and against the contribution of religions in Kenyan politics—for
them making a valuable difference on behalf of people and nation or
for them being sucked in to the venality and elitism of state politics. It
is left to the reader to learn and decide from this appropriate dialectic.
Are the churches compromised and co-opted or are they reforming and
transforming politics? In which direction is the trend now moving? Of
course a religion that was not rooted in contemporary culture would
not have the leverage to affect it, but a church that has lost its saltiness
will not stop the rot. Where is the balance to be drawn and who is to
regulate it?
Again this book would not have happened but for the “famous four”
Protestant clergy, who put their heads above the parapet when many
refused to do so and faced the onslaught of the powers that be. There
are all too few in their own denominations and in Africa who have had
such a ministry as Henry Okullu, David Gitari, Timothy Njoya, and
Alexander Muge. Gitari’s Episcopal Roman Catholic contemporary,
Archbishop Ndingi Mwana’a Nzeki, also deserves a mention, though
I personally never had the opportunity to enter his sphere during my
nine-year service of the Anglican church in East Africa. Between them
they have made a difference in Kenya’s history, especially when compared
xii Preface and Acknowledgments
with Uganda’s. Each had a burning concern arising out of their faith
that justice be done in the world, which transcended personal ambition
or gain. They knowingly risked much, and in a different time or place,
could have paid a higher penalty than they did. Many would say that
Muge paid the highest price with his early death on the road. While
the book is centered on issues and processes rather than personalities,
the topic’s focus is given by the work of the former archbishop of the
Anglican Church of Kenya, David Gitari, who of the four has had the
longest-running influence and the most structural. Though he retired
in 2002, the contributors have taken their analysis forward to the trau-
matic events of 2008. I am particularly grateful to David Gitari and the
Church Mission Society for giving me seven years in which to watch
this process at close quarters and to encourage it in a younger genera-
tion of clergy who are yet to rise to the top, though several have already
become bishops or doctors of the church. The dearth of prophecy will
not be forever.
I am grateful to those former students, and others who knew me less,
for enabling my access to rich oral evidence, though not much of it has
been brought into this book. I heartily thank the sometime members of
St Andrew’s College, Kabare, particularly my faithful colleague Justus
Mbogo, for energizing my activity in Kenya and for their welcome on
my repeated returns since.
In producing the book, I was helped by Caroline Mose, now
embarked on her doctoral studies in University College, London, who
performed some copyediting work. Thanks are due to Luba Ostashevsky,
Colleen Lawrie, Laura Lancaster, and the production team of Palgrave
Macmillan for selecting this project, holding on to it, and enabling its
completion.
The Oxford Centre for Mission Studies allowed me reading time and
its library resources for me to continue my education in the topic of
this book while being employed by them. My students there may have
found us discussing Kenyan affairs not directly related to their research
topic. Above all I must give gratitude to the one who led me most
unexpectedly to Africa in the first place, through the agency of Philip
Price and John Stott, obliging me to attend to, and so to understand,
the other.
The African Studies Centre in the University of Oxford, where my
wife, Wanja, serves as Administrator, has attracted many “Kenyanists”
over the last decade to Oxford. They are represented by name in the
bibliography, but their ideas have been an aural stimulant of the highest
quality! Last, but no means least, I express my appreciation to my family
who bore most of the cost of this nocturnal vigil. If they read this book,
