A 60-year-old man, Titus Ngonyo Gandi, the father of a GSU officer who died in the Shakahola tragedy on Tuesday, told the Mombasa High Court how he lost four additional family members in the same incident.
Gandi testified that in 2019 he began noticing disturbing behaviour in his wife, Esther Mbila, who had started preaching against children attending school or receiving any form of education.
He said she also warned neighbours against working for the government or obtaining government-issued documents such as birth certificates, identity cards, and academic certificates.
Gandi broke down as he revealed that he has since buried his wife, two children—including his son, the GSU officer—one grandchild, and his daughter-in-law, all of whom died in the Shakahola massacre.
The prosecution also presented another witness, Robert Kithi, a 23-year-old former resident of Shakahola who fled the area in 2023 after followers were instructed to begin fasting in preparation for “going to heaven.”
Kithi told the court that the starvation directive was issued after a meeting allegedly chaired by Pastor Paul Mackenzie, who claimed that the order “came from God” as part of preparing for entry into heaven.
He said he had previously attended the Good News International Church in Malindi before it was closed in 2020 when Mackenzie declared that the church’s mission had been “completed.”
According to Kithi, Mackenzie later instructed followers to relocate to the Jagwani area in Shakahola to await the coming of the Messiah. He said followers were told that a rapture would occur three years after 2021—around mid-2023—and many moved to Shakahola believing in this prophecy.
Kithi testified that he opposed the fasting directive and eventually fled when the starvation intensified. While living in Shakahola, he said he had been assigned security duties, including guarding a dam from wild animals.
He also revealed that he buried two of his siblings in November, but his mother refused to let him retrieve their bodies, insisting that they had “gone to the Messiah.”
Another witness, DCI officer Paul Oguta, based at the DCI headquarters, told the court that he was instructed by his supervisor to travel to Shakahola following reports that two children had been killed and secretly buried there. Oguta said his team was shocked to find several people starving under a tree in the area.
“I was assigned to oversee the postmortem of victims who had died at Malindi Mortuary, while others were tasked with conducting exhumations,” Oguta said.
He testified that he attended 88 postmortem examinations and produced the reports before the court, confirming that he was present throughout the process.
The Registrar of Companies was among the other witnesses who testified on Tuesday in the murder case against Paul Mackenzie and 30 others.
