Kenya to host LGBT funding meeting
Later this month (June 2019) the east African nation of Kenya will host a meeting bringing together international donors of the continent’s anti-Christian lobby groups and the LGBT and Prostitution NGOs they fund, Christian Voice has learned. More about this below.
Anti-sodomy law upheld
The high-level meeting comes just weeks after Kenya’s High Court ruled against campaigners seeking to overturn a decades-old law banning sodomy. The BBC was of course, disappointed by the ruling.
Three judges rejected claims that the law violated the new constitution, which guarantees equality, dignity and privacy.
The penal code criminalises ‘carnal knowledge against the order of nature’. Such activity is punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
Campaigners and western commentators such as the BBC complain the law dates back to the colonial era but struggle to find any convictions for what they euphemistically describe as ‘gay sex’ in Kenya.
Pro-sodomy lobby group
In such a socially conservative country it comes as something of a surprise to find a specific pro-sodomy lobby group.
But Kenya actually has a handful, of which the wealthiest is the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission. (NGLHRC). This NGO led the action to overturn the law. Its leader said the legislation ‘gave rise to a climate of homophobia.’
Of course it does. The whole point of the law is to prevent homosexual activity. It also discourages lesbianism. Meanwhile, any idea that men or women can change sex is met with incredulity not just in Kenya but across Africa as a whole.
Trying to use the law to change public opinion is common in the West and activists had hoped it might gain a foothold in Kenya and spread out wider.
This explains the exasperation of Njeri Gateru, co-founder and executive director of NGLHRC and her complaints about ‘prejudice’.
In March this year the Court of Appeal in Nairobi upheld a 2015 High Court decision compelling the Non-Governmental Organizations Coordination Board to officially register the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (NGLHRC) as an NGO. In December 2012 they held an inaugural Gay and Lesbian Awards in Nairobi’s City Hall.
It is not illegal in Kenya to identify oneself as homosexual.
Western money
In common with other anti-Christian NGOs across Africa, the NGLHRC depends on international support. It raises little money from Kenyans. It is funded by Western foundations such as the Sigrid Rausing Trust. Trustees include Swedish heiress Sigrid Rausing herself and Establishment mzee Andrew Puddephatt.
The Trust’s website confirms: ‘SRT has supported NGLHRC since 2017. Total funds received to date: £110,000 . Current grant: £180,000 over 3 years. Grant start: 1st August 2018.’
That is mega-money. The average salary in Nairobi is currently around £6,500 per annum.
Substantial funding
Furthermore, NGLHRC claims support from ‘partners‘ such as the International Bar Association, Stonewall UK, Amnesty International and the US Department of State.
The NGLHRC 2016 accounts also reveal substantial funding from all these other wealthy overseas donors:
• Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice
• COC Netherlands
• Diakonia (Faith-based Swedish grant distributor)
• East African Sexual Health and Right Initiative (UHAI-EASHRI)
• Heinrich Böll Stiftung Foundation (HBF)
• HIVOS (Netherlands)
• Open Society Foundations (George Soros)
• PITCH Project (Partnership to inspire, transform and connect HIV response)
• The European Union
• Tides Foundation (San Francisco, US)
• United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS)
• The Canadian High Commission in Nairobi
Ford Foundation & KHRC
NGLHRC is not the only Kenyan NGO advocating for gay rights to have received overseas funding. The not-to-be-confused-with Kenya Human Rights Commission has also been in the money. Nairobi-based KHRC was founded in 1992 and began by advocating for genuine human rights.
In 2011 it moved into pro-sodomy lobbying and the cash started pouring in. The US-based Ford Foundation gave the Kenya Human Rights Commission a cool $1m in 2012. In 2015-2016, Ford Foundation gave KHRC another $1.5m. Also in 2016, Open Society Foundations gave KHRC £160,000.
Revolvy says The Swedish International Development Agency, Christian Aid, Trocaire, Danish International Development Agency, United Nations Development Programme, UNIFEM and Canadian International Development Agency have also given the KHRC substantial funds.
Headed by George Kegoro, KHRC has a current staff of fifteen. Its website says: ‘KHRC will continue to engage in national and regional advocacy on the protection and realization of the rights of LGBTI persons.’
Moreover, KHRC also criticised the Kenya High Court ruling, saying it ‘legitimises homophobia by upholding a colonial culture of exclusion, discrimination and violence against minorities’.
Proxy war
There is a proxy spiritual war going on here in which Western Christians are not even engaging.
The overseas money has enabled NGLHRC to employ six full-time staff as at 2016. They include: ‘three lawyers: Mr Eric Gitari (Executive Director), Ms. Njeri Gateru (Head of Legal Affairs), and Ms. Imani Kimiri (Security Officer).’
NGLHRC specifically names the Heinrich Böll Stiftung Foundation as enabling them to hire ‘an Accounting Officer, Ms. Annet Njoki, Ms. Cori Arudi … Office Administrator and … a Media and Communications Consultant, Ms. Kari Mugo.’ The cash also allows the publication of a professional website, glossy reports and extensive lobbying efforts.
In a nation which outlaws homosexual practice, ‘in 2016, we had two student volunteers interning with us from the University of Nairobi Law School; Faith Gaitho and Chan Mubanga.’
The ‘Commission’ website even openly names its ‘seven-person Advisory Board that meets quarterly’ as Mr. George Gachara, Mr. David Kuria, Ms. Muthoni Njogu, Ms. Beryl Ogutu, Mr. John Mathenge, Ms. Louiza Kabiru and Mr. Binyavanga Wainaina.
Answer to local prayer
Consequently, it was an answer to much local prayer in Kenya that the court ruled against such a well-funded group. Evangelical and Pentecostal Christians put in much labour of prayer and spiritual warfare. Kenyan Christians also witnessed outside the court.
Catholic bishop Alfred Rotish told Reuters news agency outside the court: ‘We cannot be another Sodom and Gomorrah’. Indeed the overwhelming majority of Christian and Muslim groups support the current law. The Kenyan attorney-general himself argued against decriminalisation.
What did the judges say?
The judges dismissed the argument that a ban on unnatural practices contravened the 2010 constitution, which protects all citizens’ privacy and dignity.
Presiding judge Roselyne Aburili declared to a packed courtroom: ‘We find the impugned sections [of the penal code] are not unconstitutional’.
She also found that allowing sodomy would ‘open the door for same-sex unions’. In her commentary she added that there was ‘no conclusive scientific proof that LGBTQ people are born that way.’
The judges ruled that while they respected changes to laws on homosexuality in other countries, it was the court’s duty to respect prevailing Kenyan values.
June funding conference
Undaunted, later this month, donors and immorality NGOs will come together in a major bi-annual conference held in a secret location in Nairobi. The ‘Africa Donors Meeting’ will bring grantmakers together from Monday, 17th June to Tuesday 18th. Then from Wednesday, 19th to Friday 21st June, the ‘Changing Faces Changing Spaces Conference’ is billed as ‘Africa’s largest convening of the continent’s LGBTI and sex worker movements and donors.’
This is the seventh such conference. We read on the Global Philanthropy Project (GPP) website: ‘The CFCS VI Africa Donors Meeting in 2017 brought together 75 grantmakers from 35 organizations, representing a diversity of public and private foundations, individual and corporate funders, and government agencies, embassies, bilateral and multilateral agencies.’
Its report says it enabled ‘African activists to strategise, network, plan and reflect on achievements
and challenges pertinent to our movements’. 200 participants came including 35 donor agencies. This is big business for the African immorality movement.
The 2019 conference, costing participants between US$440 – US$2,500 is private and even secretive. Its Eventbrite page answers a FAQ on sharing about it on social media like this: ‘No! Please note that this is a non-public meeting, intended to be shared only with those who are participating in person. We request that participants respect this guidance by refraining from sharing photos, location check-ins, or other updates on social media.’
Indigenous funding?
GPP was itself founded in only 2009, as was its member fund UHAI EASHRI. Uhai is kiswahili for ‘life’ while EASHRI stands for ‘East African Sexual Health and Rights Initiative’. Its website claims that ‘UHAI is Africa’s first indigenous activist fund for sex workers and sexual and gender minorities.’
It distributes money across anti-Christian groups in Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.
But its claim to be an ‘indigenous activist fund’ is, as you may have guessed, economical with the truth. UHAI is solely funded by Western largesse.
LGBT Funding
For example, on 9th February 2018 the Baring Foundation gave UHAI EASHRI, 4 grants totaling £760,000. It went to: ‘Supporting civil society organisations working with and for lesbian, bisexual and queer (LBQ) women and trans and gender diverse communities in East Africa.’
Sigrid Rausing Trust ‘has supported UHAI since 2013. Total funds received to date: £670,000
Current grant: £390,000 over 3 years; Grant start: 1st June 2017.’ They too confirmed ‘UHAI provides grants and capacity support to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) and sex worker organisations in Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.’
The UK-based homosexual donations charity Give-Out has also provided money to UHAI-EASHRI.
Addresses:
One website says UHAI EASHRI operates out of offices at: 3rd Floor, Suite 5, Rosami Court, Muringa Rd., Kilimani P.O. BOX 7144-00300, Nairobi.
KHRC is at Gitanga Road opp. Valley Arcade Shopping Center, P.O Box 41079-00100, Nairobi, Kenya
NGLHRC is at: Mpulla House, # 4 Arboretum Drive, (off State House Road), Nairobi, Kenya
P.O BOX 52695- 00100, Nairobi, Kenya
Ford Foundation: Rahimtulla Towers, Hill Ln, PO Box 41081, 00100, Nairobi, Kenya,
Open Society Kenya Office: 1st Floor, ACS Plaza, Lenana Road, P O Box 2193-00202, Nairobi
Open Society also has offices in Kampala and Dar es Salaam.
Scripture and Prayer
READ: Eccl 10:19; Job 4:8; Psa 2:1-12, 5:4,9, 7:9, 52:7, 94:23; Prov 1:16, 4:17, 10:2, 16:2; Isa 59:7; Jer 1:16; Mic 3:11; Mal 3:15-18; Matt 16:18; Mark 7:21-23; Acts 1:8; Rom 1:26-32; Eph 6:12; 2Tim 1:7; 1John 5:19; Rev 2:26, 4:11, 20:6.
PRAY: 1 Thank God for the Kenya High Court ruling. Thank God for the prayers of Christ’s faithful people which made it possible. Praise him for righteous judges. Thank God that even in the face of extravagant Western funding of pro-immorality NGOs, his righteousness has prevailed.
2 The Africa Donors Meeting: Firstly, Pray the Lord reveals its location. Secondly, pray for a great witness outside the venue. Thirdly, pray for confusion over its proceedings and repentance among its participants.
3 On the legal front, pray firstly for a law to prohibit money from overseas donors funding organisations promoting illegal and immoral practices in Kenya. Local offices of such organisations should be shut down. Both Ford Foundation and Open Society have offices in Nairobi. Secondly, pray for the Kenyan Parliament also to pass a law to prevent persons from publishing propaganda for illegal and immoral practices.
Western pressure
It would be interesting to know what funds Her Majesty’s Government has sent over the last five years to African NGO’s promoting LGBT rights. Also, what political pressure has the UK Government and others put on the Kenyan Government about Kenya’s laws preventing sodomy and abortion?
We urge Christians worldwide to pray against the neo-colonialism of the UK and other Western nations. It is built on the racist assumption that the white man is more civilised and advanced than Africans. He isn’t. The West is decadent and ripe for the judgment of Almighty God:
Psalm 9:17 The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.
Psalm 33:12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.
Proverbs 14:34 Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.
Isaiah 5:20 Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
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