Look at tithing, get the culprits

The directive by the President to conduct lifestyle audits for all senior Government officials is a tall order. The average well-to-do Kenyan hides his wealth, whether ill-gotten or not.

This is because of the cultural belief that wealth will elicit jealousy. This jealousy then activates the forces of hell and unleashes such bad luck that exposure of your wealth leads to its ultimate loss.

So entrenched is this taboo, there are entire teachings on how, if you have an interview, you must of necessity keep it very hush hush, or the devil may hear of your blessing and doom your interview to failure. As a result, audits of such nature can only happen via two conduits.

First is clandestine affairs, the other is the church. I know this is an odd pairing, but what is more odd is that I am not including the spouse, because of another taboo that dictates one does not reveal their true wealth.

To do so, is to ensure an early trip to the grave courtesy of a money hungry spouse, who sees your death and a possible life sentence as better futures than living off your generosity.

Because of all this true wealth can only be discovered through the “clande” who is a male or female who is usually much younger. Now do not imagine that they know one’s true wealth, far from it. Instead, the lifestyle the clandestine affair is accorded determines the disposable income one has.

Higher lifestyle

It is simple, clandestine affairs are maintained by the least amount of money possible that the spouse will not realise is missing. Thus the clande in Kilimani shows a higher lifestyle than the clande kept in Umoja on the 7th floor of a liftless building. Equally the number of clandes determines the lifestyle value of the “sponsor”, as they are called colloquially.

This audit would bear much more fruit as it will be simple to ask how a civil servant earning Sh100,000 is able to pay for three houses of Sh20,000 each for his ‘clandes’, and still maintain a family and pay fees for university for both his child and the clande’s, hopefully in different classes.

The second method is to vet what I call money laundering via tithe. One habit most Kenyans have is to always give faithfully to church. In fact, every Sunday our TV screens are full of news of politicians standing in pulpits after giving hefty amounts to different churches.

How do these politicians afford to give hundreds of thousands of shillings every weekend at every church 53 times a year? Similarly, every member of a church has a tithe number, to ensure they give. Giving is a key success factor in modern churches. If you want to be respected, you must be a grand giver.

Deacons and elders are selected from the creme de la creme of financial society. Thus every civil servant who attends a church is a giver and tither and I can bet you that that giving is beyond the realms of what the civil servant’s salary allows.

Since most pastors are like Gehazi, accepting offering from friend and foe without regard of where the money came from, there is never a question, instead the money is offered to God in a spiritual money laundering that turns the sins of the corrupt into a first row seat in church.

Churches silent

Still there are those who ask people to take loans to give offering, what insanity! It is this marriage, by the way, that fuels corruption, because they, like Gehazi, have the same leprosy as the corrupt; greed.

You don’t believe me? Ask yourself how many pastors have asked their congregants to return stolen money. Don’t these people go to church, and if they do, didn’t they give? Which pastor has volunteered to return tithe and offering given to them by the corrupt?

The answer is none, which in my mind is like Jesus visiting vertically challenged Zacchaeus and telling him to give him a little bit of what he had stolen and he would intercede for help and salvation from the jails of Caesar.

Nay, Jesus asked Zacchaeus to give back and these followers of his must learn to do the same or drop the name Christian and call themselves money zealots.

But I digress, a quick look at church records, complete with names, which will show you exactly what someone has given and thus do a quick survey and wonder how does one who earns Sh800,000 give millions in a month to various churches and church harambees.

These miraculous stunts happen in broad daylight and on national TV. Mr. President, look no further, it is time for Kenya to come to the cross, for we are at a crossroads and not only repent, for that is easy but instead consider restitution.

Let the churches give back stolen tithe and offerings to the State on behalf of their members, they should also expose those whose giving is more than what is expected from their salaries.

After all you are either an Elisha who refuses looted offering or you are a Gehazi, white with leprosy from the guilt of eating with the thieves.

Mr Bichachi is a communication consultant. [email protected]