his former supporters talked about life in the community

Paul McKenzie was the leader of the church whose members refused food en masse

Anadolu/Contributor/Getty Images

Former members of the religious cult in Kenya, where the pastor starved people and promised “a meeting with Jesus”, new details of life in the community were shared. Currently, about 600 members of the sect are considered missing.

As are reported in AP News, Paul McKenzie opened his own church in 2003, with followers coming to town from all over Kenya. This helped him gain national popularity, with the help of which he gathered victims around him.

The charismatic leader, as his followers said, “worked miracles”, could perform exorcisms and was generous.

McKenzie received the first “attention” of law enforcement officers in 2019, when he was briefly detained for speaking out against the government’s idea to assign identification numbers to Kenyans. Then the leader of the cult called the initiative “satanic”.

In the same year, he closed his church premises in Malindi and urged the community to follow him to a leased 320 hectares of forest inhabited by wild animals.

According to those who managed to survive, Mackenzie’s followers paid small fees to own plots there. At the same time, they were forced to build houses on their own and live in villages that had biblical names, such as Nazareth.

The woman, Priscilla Riziki, left the Mackenzie church in 2017, but her daughter and three grandchildren remained in the community. She remembers how at first a kind mentor turned into a more cruel one.

According to the woman, the cult leader limited her ability to see her grandchildren. For this, their mother had to obtain the personal permission of Paul McKenzie in advance.

YASUYOSHI CHIBA/Contributor/Getty Images

YASUYOSHI CHIBA/Contributor/Getty Images

YASUYOSHI CHIBA/Contributor/Getty Images

Later, the body of one of the woman’s grandchildren was identified with the help of DNA, the daughter and two more of her children are still considered missing.

Masha, a former member of the cult, said that she realized that the leader was a “bad person” after he announced the need for children to fast. As a result of complete abstinence from food, children should die.

According to the investigation, McKenzie convinced followers that the end of the world was approaching. Mackenzie claimed that the only way to be saved and meet God is to starve.

Already after the mass deaths, the police found milk and bread in Mackenzie’s house in the settlement.

A former member of the church said she lost faith in the leader when she saw him followers removed hungry children from their families. After that they were never seen again.

The woman says that it is for community guards it was “usual” to rape women. She herself was sexually assaulted by four men while pregnant with her fourth child.

According to former members of the church, the consequence for members of the community was breaking the fast or trying to go to the forest without permission beating.

Autopsies of more than 100 dead Mackenzie followers showed that people died not only of starvation, but also of strangulation and blunt force injuries.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, which reinforced Mackenzie’s conviction that the end times were approaching, the leader ordered increased fasting. According to witnesses, parents were finally banned from feeding their children at the end of 2022.

According to Kenyan Bishop Thomas Kakala, the cult leader rarely quoted the Bible during his ministries.

“If you are sober and want to hear the word of God, you will not go to their church”– claims a representative of the clergy, who previously tried to discredit Mackenzie’s teachings.

Local miner Shukran Karisa Mangi said that he always comes to work drunk, but one day the influence of alcohol could not save him from shock.

The man saw the body of a close friend, whose neck was twisted so much that the head and torso were turned in opposite directions.

The victims of the brutal murder were not the first the man had seen. Earlier, he unearthed the bodies of children on the coast of Kenya, near the community of Paul McKenzie.

Mangi said that sometimes before going to sleep he sees the remains of other victims in front of his eyes, and the memory of his friend’s mutilated body keeps him awake.

According to the Kenya Red Cross, at least 600 people are missing unknown For sure now 429 dead are known – their bodies were exhumed in the forest where cult members lived.

Currently underway in Kenya litigation over Paul McKenzie and his followers. During the hearings, witnesses said that the pastor ordered his followers to neglect education, medicine, not to eat themselves and to starve children.

The cult leader has pleaded not guilty to the murders of 191 children and several counts of involuntary manslaughter and other crimes. If the court ultimately finds him guilty, McKenzie will spend the rest of his life behind bars.