Muslim leaders yesterday reacted angrily to plans by 40 bishops to shoot down the draft constitution at the referendum stage unless the Kadhi's Courts are removed from it.
They said they would ensure that the Kadhi's Courts remain in the draft and were enshrined in the final constitution.
The leaders, drawn from the Council of Imams and Preachers of Kenya (CIPK) and the unregistered Islamic Party of Kenya (IPK), said that Muslims deserved the courts and that they would not relent in the struggle to have the courts entrenched in the new constitution.
IPK chairman Sheikh Khalifa Mohammed, while delivering the Friday sermon at the controversial Sakina Mosque yesterday afternoon, claimed that the plans to remove the Kadhi Courts were funded by foreign governments.
"We will stand firm and ensure that our rights are enshrined in the national constitution," he said.
He said that the church leaders were misguided in their quest to have the courts rejected.
Mohammed said that the leaders were lying that Muslims wished to turn Kenya into an Islamic state to achieve their objectives.
The East African Standard reported yesterday that 40 bishops drawn from mainstream and evangelical churches country-wide were lobbying for support to have the issue handled by the Parliamentary Inter Party Consensus Building group as a contentious subject.