DIG Kenya police service Kanja visits Shakahola to assess progress

Deputy Inspector General of the Kenya Police Service Douglas Kanja has visited Shakahola forest.

Kanja toured the cult site in Kilifi on Wednesday to assess the progress of the ongoing operation.

He was accompanied by the Commandant GSU Eliud Lagat.

The suspect controversial pastor Paul Mackenzie is in police custody, alongside seven others,  as investigations continue.

So far, 110 bodies have been exhumed from the 800-acre land. The process was however halted due to bad weather.

On Monday, experts including Homicide Detectives, DCI, Forensic Experts and Government Chemist Experts began conducting post postmortems on the bodies.

As of Wednesday, 76 bodies had undergone the process.

Government Pathologist Johansen Oduro said the team expects to conclude the exercise on Friday and give room for the resumption of exhumation.

"The process is going on seamlessly concurrently with the process of taking DNA from relatives of missing persons," he said at Malindi Sub County Hospital Mortuary on Wednesday.

The team identified that four of the victims, three children and one adult, died due to either asphyxiation or being hit by blunt objects.

The autopsy results also show that 23 of the deceased died of starvation.

As of Wednesday, the number of people rescued at Shakahola forest was 49 while those arrested were 24.

Mackenzie, who is said to have told his followers to starve to meet their maker, denied any wrongdoing.