Shakahola: Stop spiritual conmen from exploiting women's despair

The most tragic thing about the heinous actions of Paul Nthenge Mackenzie of Good News Ministries, Malindi, who allegedly starved 59 individuals to death to “save them from the pain and suffering of the world”, is that no matter how infuriatingly unjust or outrageously sorrowful the deaths are, this vicious cycle of tragedy and injustice will persist for years to come.

Calling such actions “akin to terrorism”, as President William Ruto did, will do little to stop Kenyans, desperate and twisted from hopelessness, from buying hope at whatever price. After all, miracles don’t have a price tag. 

In the depths of despair after watching her son suffer from sickle cell disease, my mother turned to a man claiming to have a cure - a "Mackenzie" offering a blessed handkerchief at a “small fee”.

But as my brother's health continued to decline, it became clear that this supposed miracle was nothing more than a cruel deception which left us heartbroken and disillusioned.

I bet almost every Kenyan household has a story like this one. Sometimes, as in the case of deaths at the Good News Ministries, people pay with their lives, especially women.

A 2016 study by the Pew Centre titled The Gender Gap in Religion around the World revealed that women are generally more religious than men, particularly among Christians, even though most religious leaders are men. The study, however, found that the difference between men and women in Sub-Saharan Africa, for both Christians and Muslims, is minimal.

Vulnerable

While both men and women can get caught up in the iron grip of charismatic cult leaders, anecdotal evidence suggests that women are particularly vulnerable and gullible.

They are often forced to make choices that subordinate them to men, leaving them exposed to sexual and economic exploitation in the most tragic and irreversible ways.

The stereotype that men are more logical and women more empathetic can lead to tragic consequences when hope is the commodity being sold. It’s no surprise that the police found one of the Good News Ministries followers, a woman, alive in the thicket after she had lived there for some time. Despite attempts to help her, she had refused all aid.

The Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops, through its chairman, Most Rev Martin Kivuva Musonde, has expressed its shock and rightly condemned the “heinous acts that led the gullible Kenyans to their untimely deaths”, lamenting how the “so-called prophets have mastered the art of exploiting gullible Kenyans in the name of religion”.

I would have cut the word “shock” from the letter, though, given that Mackenzie is reading from the dog-eared script of many other religious leaders in Kenya that went down the same path.

Ida Odinga, before she recanted her words and apologised, called upon the National Council of Churches of Kenya to “regulate the churches under them to promote consistency and relevance in messaging for the promotion of evangelism in Kenya.”

What a shame that she took back words that would have helped sustain a steady stream of pressure on the government and policymakers to respond to the question of why it’s easier to open a church than a kiosk in Kenya, and what should be done to seal the loopholes that make this the norm.

A 2013 Daily Nation article by Verah Okeyo revealed that former President Daniel Moi worsened things when he came to power and scrapped the legal barriers that previously made founding a church a tedious, nerve-wracking process.

Religious cults deserve to be seen in the dehumanising, sinister light in which they belong. Hope-peddling is difficult to regulate but not impossible.

May the souls of the departed Kenyans not rest in peace until we find answers and solutions that will help save future generations of gullible worshippers.

The writer comments on social and gender topics ([email protected]).