The constitutional review process is headed for a damaging showdown after the government issued the Bomas conference with a terse warning: Agree to form a reconciliation committee or the Cabinet will walk out.

The threat was delivered by Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Kiraitu Murungi, who also told delegates that the government believed that the proposals on devolution, the Executive and transitional arrangements could plunge the country into chaos.

Though delegates approved that the team - the so-called consensus building committee - be formed, a group of MPs later met and issued a statement, signed by 80 MPs and reportedly enjoying the support of a third of the House and opposed the formation of such a committee.

They also promised a "State burial" for the two Bills authorised by the Cabinet to amend the Constitution and the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission Act. The Bills were unveiled by Kiraitu after a Cabinet meeting on Monday.

Yesterday, it became apparent that there was an overt struggle for the control of the review process pitting the government against the delegates.

The Bills, among other things, propose to give the House the power to amend the Bomas draft and also provide that the commission takes over the writing of the constitution if the conference is unable to complete its work within the specified period.

Yesterday, most delegates were of the view that the government's demand for a consensus building committee was "a play and delay" tactic aimed at wresting the process from them. 

The Bomas conference is to come to an end on March 19, and the delegates fear that they may not beat that deadline if a consensus committee takes a long time to set up and even longer to deliberate.

The bone of contention would appear to be the chapters on the Executive, devolution of powers, transitional arrangements and people's representation in the revised Draft Zero.

Kiraitu, addressing the delegates in the afternoon, said the government had serious reservations about the four chapters.

He appeared to read the mood of the delegates correctly when he said they seemed keen to pass the chapters with all the contentious issues.

He said that if the chapters were adopted the way they are, they would create room for instability in government and country and cause serious disruptions.

It was then that he suggested that the conference and the government form a consensus building committee to harmonise the contentious and competing issues.

But the delegates, who were working late into the evening, vowed to continue with their adoptions of the articles in Draft Zero and beat the March 19 deadline.

They said that they would this morning demand that the consensus committee and the work of the conference proceed at the same time.

Some delegates were calling on their colleagues to withdraw any motions they may have filed against articles in Draft Zero so that the process can move faster.

Earlier in the morning, the chairman of the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission, Prof Yash Pal Ghai, met a hostile reception at a meeting of the conference's Steering Committee.

Ghai came under fierce attack for his proposal that a compromise be worked out on the chapter on devolution of powers.

Ghai had, in a document on devolution, shot down the proposals by the technical committee as expensive, divisive and unworkable.

He drew the ire of Dr Mutakha Kangu, nicknamed the high priest of devolution, who was a rapporteur on the devolution committee, and the delegates.

In the plenary, however, there was no stopping the delegates from backing a motion that the principles of devolution be adopted ahead of today's discussion of the controversial chapter

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