The Spouse of the Deputy President, Pastor Dorcas Rigathi, has called on religious leaders at the Coast region to join hands in saving the boy child.
Speaking during a consultative forum with interfaith leaders and elders in Mombasa, Pastor Dorcas said the leaders have a solution to the challenges facing the boy child at the Coast.
“When speaking about the boy child, I know I am advocating the case for the girl child. When we have a strong and empowered boy child we will have strong families, we will have a secure nation,” she said.
Pastor Dorcas said the religious leaders must speak in one voice against drug barons in the region.
On Monday, she visited illegal drug dens in Shimanzi area of Mombasa County and interacted with the addicts of numerous drugs and substance abuse.
“It is a common thing we can agree to do, and save the boy child who is lost there and can be radicalized by anybody to buy drugs. This man that is out there (in the streets) is the future of this country, but he is in the gutter. We must advocate against drug barons; we cannot sit and see people wiping out a generation,” she said.
“If we are going to make the seed carrier to be killed by people who are intentionally selling poison to them and just watch and see them die, as people of God we are not doing the right thing.”
She further called on the religious leaders to help in providing a father figure to the street boys who expressed themselves to her during her visit to the Coast region.
“As the people who God has called, we must change this situation and it is a cry as a mother, please help me. It is my responsibility to change their lives,” she said.
Pastor Dorcas said a neglected boy child will be a disaster to other children as well as the security of the nation.
“We must save a generation, even if it is one boy that we will rescue, that will be enough for me. These boys must be brought out of the streets. They have dreams that must be validated,” she said.
The religious leaders drawn from Mombasa, Kilifi, Lamu, Kwale, Tana River and Taita Taveta counties vowed to support the initiative that they say is a brilliant idea not just for the Coastal region but the nation.
Under the initiative, the religious leaders will use their platforms such as churches, mosques and temples to reach out to the boy child for guidance and counselling as well as feeding programs that have already started in Nairobi.
The leaders were drawn from Christian, Muslim and Hindu religions as well as Kaya Elders.
