Kindiki: Elephants Forced Mackenzie Followers To Return To Shakahola

Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki, on Friday, May 26, alleged that efforts by starving followers of controversial preacher Paul Mackenzie’s Shakahola cult to escape to the neighbouring Tsavo National Park from Chakama Ranch hit a snag.

Appearing before the Committee on the Proliferation of Religious Organisations, which is investigating the Shakahola deaths, Kindiki noted that the followers had encountered a herd of elephants at the national park.

According to the CS, the 91 people who have so far been rescued had relocated to the vast national park but their obstruction by the elephants had ruined their stay, forcing them to turn back to the forest which is currently a crime scene.

However, they were intercepted by authorities at Chakama Ranch, who were informed that they were Mackenzie's followers.

Aerial view of Shakahola Forest. /AL JAZEERA

“Our experience in the last two weeks is that some of the people we rescued, we never rescued them inside Shakahola land; they were moving towards the National Park.

“Some of them had been chased by elephants so they came back to Chakama ranch and we arrested them. When we interviewed them, they said they were Mackenzie’s people,” he stated.

Additionally, details released before the Senate ad hoc committee investigating the proliferation of self-styled churches pointed out that Mackenzie had completely brainwashed his followers to believe that the world would end in June 2023.

“Perhaps they had been radicalized and indoctrinated to believe that they would have died not through not being trampled by elephants but through starvation. They were afraid of elephants yet they were going to die,” Kindiki added.

He made the revelations even as government agencies readied for a 24-hour search in the Shakahola forest through ground and aerial surveillance, adding to the senators that the Ministry of Interior extended the dusk-to-dawn curfew in Shakahola for another 30 days to ensure agencies make progress.

“We want the search and rescue to move to 24 hours daily without interruption. The only thing we are interrupting is exhumation to ensure the mortuary is cleared which is done scientifically and in accordance with international law,” he said.

The government identified 10 more mass graves though satellite imagery indicated that there could be more graves in the 800-acre parcel of land. Pieces of evidence obtained showed that Mackenzie was on a mission of organizing huge mass graves to bury more people.

“His recruitment would have been continuous but we also suspect that more of his followers are scattered not within 800 acres but some are collated into the neighbouring Tsavo national park,” the Interior CS stated.

The CS, while appearing before Senators, further pointed an accusing finger at the Judiciary over what he termed as loopholes in the criminal justice system that had facilitated the release of the controversial preacher despite several attempts by the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) to obtain custodial days to detain him.

“We attempt to have Mackenzie charged in court not only this administration but also the previous one. Even as we introspect this matter as a country and ask hard questions.

“We would like the Judiciary to look inwards as an organ and ask themselves where they were when this was happening,” said Kindiki, with investigations so far showing that most bodies were buried in March 2023 which was the last time he was released on bail, allowing him to expedite his cultic atrocities.

According to the post-mortem done, the majority of the people who died in Shakhahola succumbed due to starvation while others were either strangled to death or hit with a blunt object, with the CS indicating that the majority of the victims died in a period of not more than 26 days before they were exhumed, indicating a possible monumental issue.

So far, 241 bodies have been recovered from Shakahola while 91 others were rescued in the operation being conducted by multi agencies. Out of 93 DNA samples taken, 19 bodies have been identified.

The operation has since been suspended after Malindi Hospital Mortuary was overwhelmed with bodies exhumed from the forest, to give room for logistical preparations for the second phase of postmortem examination at the Malindi morgue.