“I am 47 years old now, without a child, yet I was once a father of six. I blame suspected cult leader Paul Mackenzie for my tribulations.”
This is what a tearful Stephen Mwiti told a Mombasa court while testifying against Mackenzie and his 92 co-accused in the Shakahola tragedy that claimed the lives of over 450 followers of the Good News International Church.
Fighting back tears, Mwiti testified that he would not judge Mackenzie but would leave his case to God.
He remains in anguish, still unaware of the whereabouts of his six children who left with their mother, Bahati Joan, for Shakahola Forest in 2022. The mother is one of the suspects in the ongoing cases.
“I have neither been given my six children nor their bodies for burial despite having submitted my DNA to help trace them. It has been a painful wait,” he told Chief Magistrate Alex Ithuku on Tuesday.
The distraught man blamed Mackenzie for misleading his followers, including his wife, with a false gospel.
Mwiti and Joan married in 2011, and by 2022, they had six children, aged between three and 12. They lived in Malindi.
His wife worked as both a charcoal seller and a tailor, and they were members of the Full Gospel Church.
His wife, then a devoted member of the Full Gospel Church, began tuning into a TV channel to listen to Mackenzie’s sermons.
Sometimes he would leave home with the remote control to prevent his wife from watching the channel.
“She was persistent in watching the channel. She then asked me if she could join the church in Furunzi, but I declined,” he said.
He later learned that the teachings discouraged followers from education, modern medicine and government services, declaring them ungodly.
Once a skilled tailor, she began to refuse work from clients and stopped taking their children to school and hospital.
Once a skilled tailor, she started declining work from clients and stopped taking their children to school and hospital.
“We disagreed, and I sought the intervention of her mother to convince her to stop following Mackenzie’s preaching, but this effort failed,” he said, while being guided by state counsels Jami Yamina, Victor Owiti, Alex Ndiema, Victor Simbi, and Betty Rubia.
His wife also stopped using contraceptives. “I never intended to have many children. I only wanted two. The last four were a result of Mackenzie’s preaching. But I accepted them because they were my children,” he clarified when asked if he regretted having many children.
“My wife called to inform me that she had delivered a baby boy. I never set my eyes on him,” he said.
Mwiti said their marriage was then characterised by disagreements, with his wife disappearing from their home for weeks or even months at a time.
Between 2018 and 2019, he said his wife began spreading the GNI gospel to him and their neighbours, urging them to join the church and reject government services as she believed the end times had come.
Sometime in 2018, his wife disappeared for several months before reappearing and asking for forgiveness.
“Even after coming back home, the situation worsened. She would throw away medicines whenever they were given to the children. Whenever a child fell ill, she would boil water and pray instead of taking them to hospital,” he said.
August 20, 2022, is a day that Mwiti says he will never forget.
He had left home early in the morning to run errands and returned in the evening to find his house empty.
His wife had left with the children, taking food items and the Sh2,000 that was in the house.
“Those who saw her told me she left in a tuk-tuk. That was the last time I saw her,” he said when cross-examined by Mackenzie’s lawyer, Lawrence Obonyo.
At first, Mwiti was not worried because his wife had disappeared before and returned on her own. Unknown to him, this time she was not coming back.
He was unable to contact her as she had switched off her mobile phone. The Furunzi church where she used to worship had also been closed, making his search more difficult.
“I gave up after searching for a month. I never reported the matter to the police, as I feared she could be arrested, leaving me with the difficult task of taking care of the children,” he said.
Two months later, Mwiti received an unexpected phone call from his wife. She asked for food for the children and he sent her Sh500.
She lied and said that she was in Lango Baya with the children and had taken them there to keep them away from the Covid-19 vaccine and school. That was the end of the call.
She called again asking for money for food, but this time Mwiti insisted on sending food in a parcel instead.
She refused at first, but later revealed her location when he persisted.
“That was the trick I used to know her exact location. That’s how I discovered she was in Shakahola, where Mackenzie was,” he told the court.
Mwiti said he sent the parcel and a day later went to the forest with a friend. They searched and found Mackenzie’s house, where he was with women and children.
Mwiti showed Mackenzie pictures of his children, but he denied seeing them and would not allow him to speak to them.
“I returned to Malindi afterwards and reported the matter at Malindi Police Station Children’s Department, where I was informed that I should work to save my children from Mackenzie,” he said.
However, he was redirected to Malindi Police Station and then to Lango Baya Police Station.
He received no help until the mass Shakahola deaths were exposed in March 2023. Even then, no police officer was willing to assist him, as he was repeatedly referred from one station to another.
“To date, I do not know where my children are. I have seen my wife for the first time today since 2022,” he said.
