By Dickens Wasonga.

As the clock ticks fast towards the national referendum on the country’s proposed constitution, leaders from various groupings especially in Nyanza province have adopted very strange strategies to boost the YES camp.

Only a week ago Kenyans were baffled by a story from Migori district which appeared in a section of the local print media attributed to a church minister who declared he would hence forth deny members of his church holy communion unless they register as voters ahead of the referendum to be held sometime in July this year.

The clergy, according to the media reports had asked all the members of his church to carry their voters card and produce the same before being considered for the holy communion.

That statement alone made the man of cloth an instant public figure with several media houses, both print and electronic sending their crew to conduct interviews at his rural home, including the BBC.

But that now appears not to have been the last of such strange declarations so far made by a cross section of leaders as the campaigns for and against the draft constitution hots up in the region that is largely expected to support the proposed constitution to the last man.

The head of the Holy Ghost Coptic church of Africa Rev.father John Pesa 1 stunned members of the press when he declared on Wednesday that any of his priests who would reject the draft or ask their congregation to vote against the document would be excommunicated from the church.

The controversial prelate had just declared his support for the proposed constitution and asked members of his church to follow suit or meet his wrath because to him, YES was the preferred position of his church and nobody should take a different stand.

And he immediately took the opportunity to lash out at his long time friend,former president Daniel Arap Moi who has been campaigning against the document.

Father Pesa said Moi risked losing the respect he earned over the years as a statesman by going against the wish of many Kenyans whom he said have waited for several years to get a new constitution and asked him to stop misleading the country.

And as we came to realise, the strange going-ons are not only unique to the church and its leadership.The same was now being adopted in other spheres of life too.

Within the same Migori town, matatu operators and boda-boda cyclists who do not have the voting cards are beginning to find it more difficult to get clients who demand to see the cards before being served.

According to the national chairman of the Kenya Correspondents Association [KCA] Mr. Oloo Janak, even shop shopkeepers and other small scale traders in the town now must produce to their customers a proof to show they have registered as voters.”They must dangle the cards in order to sell”said Janak.

Janak who also cordinates the activities of the Migori clan, an NGO conducting civic education in the area said several people have since registered as a result of the strategy albeit grudgingly.

”This is how serious this issue has become to the people around here. I think even though the strategy may not be acceptable to all,it has indeed scaled up the registration process in this area.”said Janak

Interim Independent electoral Commission which is charged with the voter registration exercise is targeting to register some 10 million Kenyans and have so far registered close to 8 million people countrywide.

The commission which is chaired by Hassan Isaac Ahmed has also rolled out civic education through out the country to scale up the voter registration exercise.

ENDS.