U.S. financial and rhetorical support for this constitution has some members of Congress calling for an investigation. In a letter to inspectors general of the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Republican representatives Chris Smith of New Jersey, Darrell Issa of California, and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida raised questions about American constitutional lobbying in Kenya: “The Obama Administration’s advocacy in support of Kenya’s proposed constitution may constitute a serious violation of the Siljander Amendment and, as such, may be subject to civil and criminal penalties.”
Administration officials have denied the lobbying charge. But, as the letter points out, our ambassador to Kenya has been quoted as saying that the U.S. has given Kenya $2 million for “civic education” about the constitution, and that we’re committed to more.
“The U.S. shouldn’t be interfering with this process, and we have serious questions about why the Obama administration is promoting a constitution which allows abortion on demand and waters down protections for religious freedom,” says Rebecca Marchinda of the New York–based World Youth Alliance, which has an office in Nairobi.
And, as if the West’s exporting of its abortion license to Kenya — a nation known for a growing, enthusiastic Catholic and other Christian presence — weren’t alarming enough, the proposed constitution would also create a legal system within a legal system — codifying the strengthening of sharia by making it apply to every Muslim Kenyan. As Eric Rassbach of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty points out, “People are subjected to these tribunals merely by virtue of what religious community they were born into, and they have no way of opting out.”
Ray Walser of the Heritage Foundation gives the Obama administration the benefit of the doubt: “I would suspect the administration is pushing the constitution package as a whole with the promise to reduce presidential power and to place constitutional safeguards against corruption.” That would take Joe Biden at his word. But the Achilles’ heel of this administration is that it is not, in the subtle words of Walser, “adverse to measures that permit space for sharia-like legal customs — for Muslim outreach/public-diplomacy purposes — and also walk back
Bush-administration strictures and squeamishness on abortion issues.” It also serves as a “signal that the voice of the U.S. religious lobby is not as powerful as it believes it is.”