By Hilary White
NAIROBI, Kenya, June 27, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Two abortion-promoting organizations have come under fire from the Catholic bishops of Kenya for holding a mock tribunal that ridiculed the pro-life position and demanded unrestricted abortion.
On June 26 in Nairobi, the Kenya Human Rights Commission and the Reproductive Health and Rights Alliance, held the mock trial as a publicity stunt “to publicize the negative consequences of the criminalization of abortion in Kenya.”
The two groups said in a statement, “The denial of a pregnant woman’s right to make an independent decision regarding abortion violates or poses a threat to a wide range of human rights.”
At the event, pro-life groups disrupted the planned program when they entered and demanded representation for unborn children. The activists shouted, “This forum is one-sided, who is speaking for the children?”
“We have heard the testimonies of the mothers. Who will speak for the children? Kenya is a failed state, how will legalizing murder help this country? We already have too many deaths in our society, we do not need to legalize more.”
AllAfrica.com reports that at the event, Dr Stephen Karanja, a pro-life gynaecologist, interrupted the moderator, saying the proceedings were biased. “The woman has to be alive before she can enjoy her human rights. The right to life is supreme, then comes the right to choice.”
Another in attendance, Okiya Omtatah, a writer, said, “This room does not constitute the face of Kenya. This is a foreign agenda that is being imposed on Kenyan citizens.”
The Catholic bishops have identified the mock tribunal as part of a larger international effort to impose the anti-child abortion mentality of western feminism into Kenyan society.
“A state which legalizes abortion most definitely abdicates a very basic reason for its own existence,” the bishops said in a statement.
“It is important, very important indeed, to note that abortion has never put an end to women’s social distress, but that it simply adds a personal tragedy.”
“There is no reason or motive that can ever objectively confer the right to dispose of another’s life.” The bishops said, “Abortion, whether legal or not, kills babies, damages women, harms families, degrades the medical profession, weakens nations and destroys churches.”
High levels of poverty and unemployment in an agricultural economy and a relatively high birth rate of 4.82 children born per woman makes Kenya a favoured target of international population control organizations, largely funded through the US. Kenya’s population is also strongly Christian at 45% Protestant, and 33% Catholic.
Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
United Nations Human Rights Committee Pushes Kenya to Legalize Abortion and Homosexuality
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/mar/05031801.html