Special Correspondent
New Delhi Times
August 10, 2023
Kenya police exhumed remains of followers of a doomsday Christian cult named Good News International Church from shallow graves in Shakahola forest of Kilifi county in southwest Kenya. Forensic experts and homicide detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) sorted the remains. The mass graves were scattered across a 800-acre forest area.
Police removed 179 exhumed bodies to hospital mortuary for identification and autopsy. As of July 18, 2023, the death toll has risen over 400. Keyan Red Cross installed a refrigerated container on April 26 to store exhumed bodies. The rescued survivors were too weak to walk. More than 610 people are still missing, perhaps buried in undiscovered graves.
Delirious from hunger, a believer had sent a distraught text to his younger sister begging for her help to escape. “I don’t have much time. Sister, End Times is here and people are being crucified,” he said but couldn’t escape the grip of the preacher. Disconsolate and angry relatives of missing and dead called the culprit a demon who has “ruined too many lives.”
Mastermind: The bodies belong to cult followers of a self-proclaimed pastor Paul Nthenge Mackenzie based in coastal Kenya who incited them to starve to death “to meet Jesus”. Mackenzie was arrested in April, set free, rearrested, produced in court on May 5, denied bail and held in custody. Investigation continues on murder and terrorism charges. Trial is on for past cases of deaths of children in his church.
Autopsies: Autopsies conducted on more than 100 bodies revealed death by starvation, strangulation, asphyxiation, and bludgeoning. Some had internal body organs removed. Total 26 culprits including Mackenzie, his wife and 16 other suspects were arrested. Roman Catholic or Anglican churches have hierarchies and rules but Evangelical Christianity are run by freelance preachers with no oversight. They are popular across Africa. About half of Kenyans are evangelicals, disproportionately higher than in America.
Mackenzie’s Profile: Mackenzie’s journey from destitute to taxi driver to cult leader and televangelist is fairy tale. He set up television channel in 2002 and own church—Good News International Church— in 2003 following the Bible as the ultimate spiritual authority. His evangelical message was salvation through faith in Christ but his preaching became increasingly apocalyptic of the coming Battle of Armageddon and the End Times agonies prophesied in the Book of Revelation, the final book of the New Testament.
In 2017, he castigated education and medicine as bad since everything bad started with this, forbade worshipers to send children to school or see doctors, set up own unregistered, fee-paying school at church, claimed divine healing powers, and treated people for money. He claimed having received a revelation from God. His Times TV— a gospel channel— beamed his fiery sermons on the internet and across Africa. Arrested in October 2017 for promoting radicalization, extremist beliefs, and terrorism he pleaded not guilty and was acquitted. He was detained again in 2019 but released on bail. He confronted the government, denounced national identification numbers for citizens as “the mark of the beast” and precursor to approaching apocalypse. Threat of prosecution made him close down the church.
His plans turned devilish. Making money became his main interest, preaching came second. He retreated to Shakahola Forest and invited followers to purchase plots in new Holy Land, marketing that land as an evangelical Christian sanctuary from the fast-approaching apocalypse. He sold land he did not legally own. The Covid pandemic, 2020 increased the appeal of Mackenzie’s land offer. Forget haven; that 800-acre property is now a gruesome crime scene.
Mackenzie got increasingly obsessed with the coming apocalypse. Prophesizing that the world was coming to an end he issued “new instructions” to hundreds of people to move to Shakahola, which was now divided into districts with biblical names like Jericho and Jerusalem. He cast himself as a Christ-like figure. Jesus lived most of his life in Galilee. Mackenzie called his living area as Galilee. His preaching lured hundreds to abandon home and move to the remote wilderness of Shakahola Forest in 2021, with wife and children. Nearby residents raised alarm over mass exodus to the forest. Relatives and ex-members tried to intervene, but followers refused to be rescued.
Children Were the First to Perish: His was a methodical plan of mass suicide through starvation. Children had to fast in the sun to die faster, and perish. Womens’ turn came later. Men were the last. Trapped followers had no choice but “to go through to the end.” Starting a fast they were happy to be dying soon to see Christ in Golgotha—the site of Jesus’s crucifixion in the Bible. People initially had great admiration for Mackenzie who “changed because of his false prophecies,” about the end of the world. He plans to stay alive to lead his followers to “meet Jesus” through starvation and then starve himself to death before the end of the world. His online video said he “heard the voice of Christ telling me that ‘the work I gave you to preach End Time messages for nine years has come to an end.’
Government’s Action: Government couldn’t stop the horrific murders—“Shakahola Massacre.” It acted too late. Kenya—among Africa’s most modern and stable nations—couldn’t sense the macabre goings-on between two popular tourist destinations, Tsavo National Park and the Indian Ocean coast.
President William Ruto equated starvation death with terrorism and formed a commission of inquiry for investigation. Ruto himself is a fervent believer and his wife an evangelical preacher, hence can’t check evangelics. He asked church leaders and legal experts to propose ways to regulate Kenya’s chaotic faith sector.
Mackenzie planned death for followers and lured them to their graves by promises of salvation. Freedom granted to him went too far. Hundreds of people disregarded the basic human instinct to survive and chose starvation to die. Why did they obey? “Shakahola Massacre” stretched the limits of religious freedom enshrined in the Kenyan Constitution.
Police are questioning other religious leaders with similar misleading teachings contrary to basic human rights. The methods of deaths indicate a ‘highly organized crime’. Kenya has a religious society and cults are common but Shakahola Massacre is too horrific to be forgotten. Can freedom of worship supersede the right to life?
https://www.newdelhitimes.com/kenya-doomsday-cult-death-toll-exceeds-400/
No comments:
Post a Comment