Speech Delivered by the General Secretary Rev Canon Peter Karanja, During the Official Opening of the 63rd General Assembly, Kanamai, Kilifi County

GS Remarks Deputy President Hon. William Ruto flanked by the Council Officials during the official opening of the 63rd General Assembly

ADDRESS DELIVERED
BY
REVEREND CANON PETER KARANJA
GENERAL SECRETARY

INVITING

HIS EXCELLENCY HON WILLIAM SAMOEI arap RUTO

THE DEPUTY PRESIDENT
OF
THE REPUBLIC OF KENYA
TO
THE 63RD NCCK GENERAL ASSEMBLY
ON AUGUST 2018
AT
JUMUIA CONFERENCE & BEACH RESORT KANAMAI, KILIFI COUNTY

A. PRELIMINARIES:
Your Excellency, Hon William Samoei arap Ruto, the Deputy President of the Republic of Kenya,
NCCK Trustees and Patron,
Rev. Canon Dr. Rosemary Mbogo, Chairperson of the NCCK,
Archbishop Dr. Timothy Ndambuki, Vice Chair of the NCCK,
Dr. Nelson Makanda, Deputy General Secretary,
Delegates from member churches organizations and the regions,
Staff of NCCK,
Brothers and Sisters in Christ.
B. INTRODUCTION:
I am greatly delighted to officially welcome you to this auspicious triennial gathering of the 63rd General Assembly of the National Council of Churches of Kenya. We thank God for his grace and faithfulness that have enabled us to once again converge here for this ecumenical engagement.
First, allow me to recognize the presence of our Chief guest in a special way, for graciously accepting to preside over this event, despite his extremely busy schedule and competing national responsibilities that require his personal attention. This is a clear indication, that you value and recognize the work of the Church in Kenya in general and the NCCK in particular and are willing to invest in a closer partnership between the church and the government.
Your Excellency, we do not take this for granted, and pray that God shall grant you good health as you serve this great republic.
Secondly, the high spirits, energy and the high level of engagement displayed by all of you our delegates, since your arrival yesterday is amazing. For this reason, I wish to commend all of you for your continuous commitment to the ideals and work of the NCCK that is now over 106 years since its inception. This is a statement of THE veracity of the vision and dreams of our founding fathers which has stood the test of time and which has impacted successive generations in the national life of our nation.
C. 63rd NCCK GENERAL ASSEMBLY:
Your Excellency the Deputy President,
I wish to take this opportunity to introduce you to this gathering, that is the single most ecumenical gathering of the National Council of Churches of Kenya. The General Assembly is the highest policy and decision making governance organ of the Council. This organ which delegates its routine work to the Executive Committee, comprises delegates from all our 32 member churches and 18 affiliate organizations, as well as officials from all our nine regions across the country.
We take pride in the fact that long before the Constitution of Kenya 2010 was drafted, the NCCK strategically devolved her operations into these regions, each with an office, staff and the requisite amenities, all geared towards ensuring optimal functioning of regional Council structures.
After the enactment of the constitution, and before the onset of Kenya’s devolution that kicked in after the General Election of 2013, NCCK created a county structure which has been operationalized as County Coordinating Committees. Through this structure, we are able to choose our delegates, who are present here today.
The Executive Committee which meets twice a year, primarily informs the engagement of this General Assembly. Under the General Assembly and the Executive Committee, are our various committees that oversee the day to day running of the Council in conjunction with the NCCK management.
The elaborate and intentional representation and national inclusivity, has positioned the Council as an authentic and true national player that advocates for the rights of the Kenyan citizenry, with a view to transforming and empowering all the people of Kenya.
And as such Your Excellency, the General Assembly remains the most pivotal gathering for our continued engagement with various stakeholders including national and county governments, development partners and the global community in the furtherance of our common aspirations as a nation.
D. STATE OF THE NATION:
Your Excellency,
Last year was a very challenging time in the history of our nation. With your indulgence, allow me to point out that the General Election once again brought out the symptomatic nature of our divisive politics that is often characterized with ethnic politics and high octane campaigns and whose net effect is loss of life and destruction of property. For this reason, our resolve to embrace authentic democracy and continue living together as a people of one indivisible nation was once again put to the test prior to and after the General Election in August last year and the subsequent repeat presidential election occasioned by the annulment of the presidential election results of August 2017.
We thank God for holding the country together especially during that watershed period that was obviously unique in the history of our great nation.
Your Excellency,
This General Assembly wishes to recognize the re-lection of the Jubilee administration and affirm your commitment to steer the country on the road to economic and socio-political stability. In addition, we commend the mutual collaboration between His Excellency the President and the former Prime Minister Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga following the 9th March “Handshake” with a view to finding lasting solutions to long standing socio-political challenges that continue to face Kenyans.
We appreciate and affirm the formation of the Building Bridges Initiative as a result of that collaboration and look forward to a quick execution of the BBI mandate as envisaged in the 9-point agenda.
Your Excellency, we consider this initiative to be quite noble given the fact that it speaks to national concerns and issues that have defied our collective efforts to create a truly cohesive and prosperous nation.
As you are aware, the Council has been engaging in peace building and national cohesion initiatives for decades but more intensely since the Post-Election Violence of 2007/2008 through the Pamoja Initiative that falls under one of our thematic areas of Governance Education and Environment. This initiative was borne out of our conviction and desire to see an integrated and cohesive country that is free from ethnic balkanization and political hangovers that often threaten our very existence as a nation.
I am happy to report that through this initiative, we have made tremendous progress among communities we have worked with, by providing safe spaces for open and genuine intra and inter-ethnic community engagement. The climax of our engagement was in June 2014, when we hosted over 200 delegates from across the country, comprising elders, women and youth at the Pamoja National Conference, that was addressed by His Excellency the President. We hope to carry through this engagement going forward and will work towards a closer collaboration with the BBI.
Away from that, we take note of the government’s efforts in the renewed fight against grand corruption. The milestones achieved over the last two months following the changes in the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions as well as Director of Criminal Investigations are quite commendable.
In view of this, we are of the view that the pervasive, extensive and corrosive nature of corruption in Kenya may need a more honest and collaborative approach to achieve lasting solutions.
We hope the conference lined up by the BBI early next month, will find a formula that enables the nation to turn over a new leaf in the fight against corruption.
The wisdom of the NCCK Executive Committee Meeting includes the possibility of offering amnesty for past corruption, to provide a critical incentive for beneficiaries of corruption to repent and turn their lives around, speed up justice for Kenyans who have suffered immensely on account of corruption, while enabling us to clean up our past as a nation.
This General Assembly undertakes to fully support all the efforts aimed at ushering in a new dispensation that guarantees a prosperous Kenya.
Other than this, I wish also to highlight the proposal of the church on Chaplaincy in our schools, that began under the immediate former Cabinet Secretary of Education now in charge of the Interior and Coordination of National Government Dr. Fred Matiangi. The church attaches so much importance to this initiative as exemplified in the recommendations that were submitted to the Ministry of Education then.
While we recognize the strides made in the implementation of our recommendations, we wish to propose that the government considers fast-tracking the implementation of our’ recommendation on Chaplaincy, with a view to stemming the rising cases of moral decadence in our schools. We are convinced that this initiative will give impetus to the mainstreaming of our education system.

E. NCCK SOCIAL ENGAGEMENT
Your Excellency,
The NCCK has endeavoured to build the capacity of Kenyans and address some of the challenges facing them through our subsidiaries and the programme department. Towards this end, the Council has continued to invest heavily in areas that speak directly to the needs of the wider society and the common person as espoused through our motto “For Wananchi.” Through our various subsidiaries, we have invested in health, banking and hospitality which this facility is part of.
I wish to highlight your Excellency, that one of the critical areas we have deliberately chosen to focus on is health, which we believe requires multiple players who are genuinely out to provide not only accessible and quality service, but also affordable healthcare. That is what we seek to do through our subsidiary, Jumuia Hospitals Ltd that now runs the 100-bed Jumuia Friends Hospital Kaimosi and Jumuia Hospitals Diagnostics and Outpatient Clinic Kakamega.
We look forward to officially open our newly built 165-bed Jumuia Hospital Huruma which is already complete and installation of equipment in progress later this year. The three facilities, that are part of our 20-year business plan, have been built and equipped at a cost of Ksh. 1 billion in our emerging model of integrated healthcare delivery.
While we appreciate the government policy on Universal Health Care which is part of Jubilee’s Big Four agenda, as well as the effort made both by the national and county governments in tackling the challenges facing the health sector, we believe that greater progress can be made in stemming medical tourism, through a well-structured Public Private Partnership.
In this respect, we appreciate the support by the President when he presided over the official opening of Jumuia Hospital Kaimosi last year, and look forward to the completion of our engagement.
The NCCK believes that a special focus needs to be put on primary health care including prevention of diseases and nutrition. Curative services should also explore the use of alternative therapies especially for chronic illnesses including cancer, diabetes and cardiovascular ailments.

The health crisis is largely in the area of public health and lifestyle diseases. Interventions of government should include a more aggressive public health education, nutritional and dietary emphasis, integration of alternative therapies and oversight of health care delivery to intentionally integrate the element components. This will enable all Kenyans to take a more proactive responsibility for their own and families’ health management. It is likely to help the shilling invested in healthcare to produce a higher outcome.
F. CONCLUSION
Your Excellency, I wish to conclude my remarks by once again appreciating your presence, and the commitment of the Jubilee government to ensure a more prosperous and cohesive nation. I wish now to invite the NCCK first woman chairperson to make her brief remarks and later invite you to address this gathering.