The discovery of mass graves containing the bodies of 58 people who are believed to be followers of Kenya cult leader Paul Mackenzie, in the Shakahola forest, sparked outrage that reverberated beyond the African country’s borders.
Kenya cult leader arrested for orchestrating mass suicide
The cult’s leader, Paul Mackenzie, was arrested following a tip-off that suggested the existence of shallow graves containing the bodies of at least 31 of his followers.
According to reports, Mackenzie instructed his followers to starve themselves to death, as they believed that this would lead them to heaven.
Earlier this month, police rescued 15 members of the group who they said had been told to starve themselves to death. Four of them died before they reached the hospital.
The death toll has been rising steadily over the past few days as exhumations have been carried out. The Kenyan Red Cross has said that 112 people have been reported missing to a tracing desk it operates, and the death toll could rise further.
Who is Paul Mackenzie? – Here’s everything we know
According to local news reports, Paul Mackenzie and his wife Joyce Mwikamba started the Good News International Church in 2003 as a small evangelical centre, which they later moved to a Kenyan village called Migingo, where his family still resides.
Over the years, the evangelist amassed a following by convincing his congregation that he had a direct line with God.
It’s reported that in 2016, one of his followers sold his property for KSh 20 million (est. R2.6 million) and gave all the proceeds to Mackenzie, who used the money to purchase land in Malindi and Mombasa, two vehicles, and fund a television station he used to spread his extremist propaganda to his audience.
The televangelist even released a gospel song called The Antichrist, in which he blasted the Catholic Church, USA, and the United Nations as ‘agents of Satan’.
In 2018, the Kenya Film Classification Board ordered the immediate closure of Mackenzie’s TV station after he and his wife were charged with religious radicalisation and promoting extremism in mainstream media.
By 2019, his church and unregistered school became the centre of ongoing probes, which forced him to relocate to Shakaola.
Earlier this year, Mackenzie forced his followers to sell everything they owned, give him the money, and then starve to death in order to meet God.
Many of them died while others suffered from severe malnutrition, prompting the government to intervene and arrest him. As of now, Mackenzie’s case is still under investigation, with the police searching his land for more bodies.
It’s worth noting that while his followers starved to death, Mackenzie himself has been eating normally, and his family continues to reside in a gated compound in Migingo.
