The case in which controversial preacher Paul Mackenzie and his 29 co-accused are facing charges linked to the deaths of over 400 people, including 191 children, in Shakahola Forest massacre in Kilifi County continued on Monday, August 26 at the Mombasa High Court.
Prosecution presented three protected witnesses before Lady Justice Diana Kavedza. The court heard harrowing accounts from a 19-year-old man, O.H. alias P.P., a 10-year-old minor, E.G.W., and an 18-year-old man, all of whom were minors at the time of the events.
P.P. testified that he was once a Muslim but was compelled, along with his parents, to convert to Christianity in order to join Mackenzie’s Good News International Church at its Makongeni branch in Nairobi.
He told the court how Mackenzie used memory verses and CDs to preach against formal education, medical care, and even national registration initiatives like the Huduma Number, which he described as the ‘mark of the beast’.
P.P. further narrated that while at Shakahola, there were many children present, including four he remembered from the church in Makongeni. He recounted Mackenzie’s teachings that Jesus had commanded followers to begin fasting to death, starting with children, then women, then the elderly, and finally Mackenzie himself, claiming that Jesus was waiting for them in the hereafter.
He gave chilling details about burial rituals referred to as ‘weddings’, describing how a deceased child, the daughter of one of the accused, was said to have “wedded Jesus.” He identified some of the accused persons as those who helped dig the graves and level the soil to conceal them, while followers clapped and sang praise songs after the burials.
He also told the court how he used to dig dams with other children in Shakahola and identified the equipment used in grave digging, CDs, and pamphlets that spread Mackenzie’s teachings.
P.P. eventually escaped Shakahola by fleeing to nearby shops, where a village elder helped link him to children officers.
The fifth prosecution witness, 10-year-old E.G.W., told the court that his father had taken him toShakahola, where they lived in an area ominously referred to as Bethlehem. He recounted witnessing the deaths of his two siblings and identified his so-called ‘death clothes’ a turquoise blue shirt and white trousers, that he was instructed to wear.
He confirmed the identities of his deceased mother and brother through post-mortem reports presented in court, supported by positive DNA results. He was eventually rescued and taken to hospital for treatment.
The sixth witness, J.N.K., a third-born in a family of seven, testified that his mother pulled him out of school while he was in class five after watching Mackenzie’s sermons on television that condemned education and medicine as sinful.
He was arrested in 2019 for not attending school and taken to a children’s home in Malindi in 2020. His father later removed him from the home using a letter and took him back to their home, only for J.N.K. to discover that his mother and four siblings were missing. He later found them in Shakahola after his father took him there.
He identified several of the accused persons as those who organized gatherings where Mackenzie would preach about the need to fast to death. J.N.K. also spoke about witnessing the so-called ‘weddings’, where followers were buried after death, and identified some of the accused who helped dig graves.
He described how he managed to escape after being locked in a house with his siblings for a week while fasting. He broke out through the roof when his parents left for a ‘wedding’ ritual and used his father’s bicycle to flee to Kakuyuni village. There, he spent the night and eventually found his way to a children’s home, where he received counselling and was later taken to Malindi General Hospital.
He later led police to their home in Shakahola, a location known among followers as Judea.
The hearing is scheduled to continue today, 26th August 2025, with more prosecution witnesses expected to take the stand.
