Shakahola village in Malindi Sub County, Kilifi County has of late hit headlines after people suspected to be members of an amorphous religious sect started fasting to death with hopes that by August this year, they will all have died and gone straight to heaven.
Former pastor Paul Mackenzie Nthenge as he wants to be referred to is said to have radicalized his followers with a tough doctrine before folding his Good News International church in 2019 insisting that he had completed the evangelism duties he was assigned by God.
It is alleged that he instructed his ‘former’ followers to go without food or water to supposedly save them from an imminent “painful death in the world”.
At his former church premises, nothing goes on there and it remains a ghost plot.
Public Service and Gender Cabinet Secretary Aisha Jumwa and Kilifi Governor Gideon Mung’aro want security agencies to take stern action against the preacher but there seems to be a loophole since Mackenzie does reside in Malindi town, 68 kilometers from the village.
“We will deal with Mackenzie for subjecting people to death by fasting and he should be arrested and detained for his own safety because if he continues to roam freely, he will be killed by members of the public,” she said at a function in Kakuyuni on Saturday.
Mr. Mung’aro on his part said that it was now time to permanently shut Mackenzie up.
“I want this guy this time round to stay in jail. He should also be subjected to that fasting under police watch for at least one week so that we see what will happen to him,” said Mung’aro.
He urged the courts not to issue lenient bond terms to Mackenzie. About one month ago, the Malindi Senior Resident Magistrate Olga Onalo released Mackenzie on an Sh. 10,000 bond after he was presented to the court in connection with the death of two children.
Mung’aro’s calls were supported by MUHURU Rapid Response officer Francis Auma who claimed that the bond terms were too lenient.
On Thursday, four people died while being transported to the Malindi Sub County hospital which is 68 kilometers from Shakahola where they had been rescued together with 11 others.
By Friday evening, two more succumbed at the same hospital while receiving treatment, according to police sources.
Survivors of the fasting ritual say they had been told to fast to avoid “apocalyptic damnation”.
According to police sources, the section of the villages is bushy and inaccessible and people there are hostile hence police cannot retrieve more bodies buried in shallow graves.
However, pinning down Mr. Mackenzie as he insists to be referred to proves to be tricky since the victims of his teachings suffer in their homesteads and not in the farmer’s compound.
“I was a preacher from 2003 until 2019 in August when I folded the ministry. People say that the government closed my ministry but that is not the correct position since I received a voice from God that directed me to close the ministry after completing prophecies on the end times,” said Mackenzie during a recent interview.
“I am now a normal person. I told people education is evil and I was jailed for that but today schools are teaching lesbianism and gayism in schools. I also told them that the world economy will collapse and that the huduma number is evil but President Ruto has coined it with an English language,” he added.
He has denied subjecting people to fast to death saying that he closed down his church and abandoned preaching.
“They say that I am forcing people to fast yet I no longer have followers. Let the DCI do a thorough investigation since I reported to them that my name was being soiled by people claiming that I am killing people and burying them,” he said.
Some of the believers have managed to unchain themselves from the doctrines after failing to meet the tough conditions.
One of them is Salama Masha who vacated the area together with her five children and left behind her husband who ‘fortunately’ or unfortunately succumbed to hunger after fasting by believing he will go to heaven in death.
“I am a member of the religion and we started doing normal fasting until we were told our time has come and we should start continuous fasting but children should be the first ones and then after they are all gone women should start then after that, men will fast,” she said.
The Malindi Sub County Hospital Medical Superintendent David Mang’ong’o told journalists that three male persons and three females were taken into the custody of the DCI on Thursday while a man and a woman were admitted at the health facility.
“The patients were very dehydrated, and our health workers managed to stabilize them. Out of 9 patients, 7 have cooperated to be treated while 2 up to now have not cooperated and they are not willing to be treated or take any fluids because they are fasting,” he said.
He called on religious leaders to come out and talk to residents about the bizarre ritual.
“We need religious leaders to come forward and convince these people to accept treatment. Some of them are very weak,” he said.
