Regulate, but after consultation

NAIROBI: Proposals by Attorney General Githu Muigai to regulate churches have rubbed clerics the wrong way. Their reaction was to threaten the government in a way they knew would get results, and it would seem they have won the first round following President Uhuru Kenyatta's directive that concerned parties sit at a round table for further discussions.

Looked at objectively, some of the proposals were actually good for the church which, needless to say, has failed to self-regulate. Effective self-regulation would have ensured that some of the mushrooming churches with cultic practices and strange beliefs that go counter to biblical teachings did not get a foothold in Kenya. It would have ensured deviant militant Islamic preachers did not indoctrinate the Kenyan youth.