News Brief

A Pentecostal bishop, who aided the conversion to Christianity of the leader of a violent religious group, says she has advised him to go into hiding after he received death threats - writes Fredrick Nzwili.

Maina Njenga, the leader of Mungiki, which is the Kikuyu-language word for multitude, said he converted to Christianity together with hundreds of other members on 25 October 2009.

Two days earlier, Njenga was released from prison after murder charges he had faced over the killing of 29 people who were massacred in Mathira in April, were dropped.

"I have advised Maina to stay where he is. I told him not to come to church today due to security reasons," Bishop Margaret Wanjiru of the Jesus is Alive Ministries said at Sunday worship in Nairobi on 8 November.

Wanjiru told journalists she had encouraged Njenga to go into hiding. The Daily Nation newspaper reported on 9 November that Njenga had been warned by security sources he would be killed within a month of his release.

The allegations concerning Njenja follow the killing of Njuguna Gitau, who had been serving as the spokesperson for the group which is known by law enforcement officials as a violent sect that that beheads its opponents. Gitau was shot at close range in Nairobi by three assailants.

Some Kenyan church leaders expressed concerns that the conversion of Mungiki members could have been a ploy to win more converts to the gang.

"Time will tell if they have truly reformed or they are using the churches as means of legitimising themselves and making them more acceptable to the public," Roman Catholic Bishop Martin Kivuva of Machakos told Ecumenical News International.

Wanjiru said, however, that by joining her church, Mungiki members were sending a message that they had changed and reformed.

Mungiki started as an African traditional religious group around 1988, its members sporting dreadlocks and praying facing Mount Kenya, an extinct volcano that is the country's highest mountain.

It engaged in running battles with police trying to stop the group's attempts to take control of the public transport sector [it] accused of extorting protection fees from business owners.

[With acknowledgements to ENI. Ecumenical News International is jointly sponsored by the World Council of Churches, the Lutheran World Federation, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and the Conference of European Churches.]