Kilifi cult: IG Koome to visit grave site as 47 bodies are exhumed

Security teams have exhumed 47 bodies at Shakahola forest in Malindi in three days. This is as an investigation into a preacher who told his followers to starve to death intensifies.

Inspector General of Police Japhet Koome said on Monday, April 24 he would visit the site to boost the ongoing probe and exhumation of the bodies.

Koome will later address the media at the site as the teams go on with the exhumation.

Malindi head of investigations Charles Kamau said on Sunday they exhumed 26 bodies increasing the number to 47.

He said the search was continuing not just for bodies but for survivors of the cult.  

The 800-acre (325-hectare) area of forest at Shakahola has been sealed off for the search operation.

Police expect to find more bodies that are buried in shallow graves.

15 members of the Good News International Church were rescued last week.

The church leader, Paul Makenzie Nthenge is in custody, pending a court appearance.

Police say they have so far identified 58 graves in the search even as the preacher told them they will find more than 1,000 people who had gone to “meet Jesus”.

Nthenge was arrested on 15 April after discovering the bodies of four people suspected of having starved themselves to death.

This followed a tip-off from a follower at the church.

One of the graves contained the bodies of five members of the same family - three children and their parents.

Nthenge has denied wrongdoing but has been denied bail. He insists that he shut down his church in 2019.

The followers say he told them to starve themselves in order to "meet Jesus".

On Sunday, one woman was rescued in one of the hideouts in a bad health state, witnesses and police said.

Of the bodies recovered on Sunday, three were in one grave, two in one and one in a single grave.

The grave diggers said they had also earmarked a grave with seven more people in the Sunday exercise.

Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki said he will visit Shakahola Village on Tuesday, April 25 even as he called on the Coast Regional Commissioner and security chiefs to reinforce the team currently carrying out exhumation at Nthenge’s land.

The CS called out the unfolding massacre of cult members as “the clearest abuse of the constitutionally enshrined human right to freedom of worship.”

He called for tighter regulation of religious entities including churches, mosques, temples, and synagogues across the country.

Police reported earlier on Saturday that Nthenge was on a hunger strike.

At the beginning of the exercise, the authorities had a total of 32 sites to dig up.

They had hoped to recover 32 bodies as per an informer who had tipped them off, police said. But they increased to 47.

Nthenge has been in the limelight for allegedly influencing his followers too fast to death.

In one of the graves that had been dug up, there were the bodies of five family members - a father, mother and their three children. Most of them are not from the area.

Nthenge appeared before Malindi Chief Magistrate Elizabeth Usui last Monday afternoon.

He was not required to plead to any charge, with the prosecution seeking 30 more days to hold him as they complete the probe.

He was arraigned alongside 13 other people in the case that will be mentioned on May 2.

The ruling was for the cult leader to remain in police custody for 14 days alongside six of his followers as police probe the issue.

The other seven, whom the prosecution described as victims as they had refused to eat even while in police custody, will be held for seven days for counselling, officials said.