MOMBASA: A Kenyan court on Wednesday extended by 30 days the detention of cult leader Paul Mackenzie, who authorities accuse of ordering followers to starve their children and themselves to death.
The death toll has climbed to 133, and hundreds of people are still reported missing. Authorities continue to search for human remains in shallow graves scattered throughout a forest where Mackenzie’s followers were living.
Mackenzie, leader of the Good News International Church, has not yet been required to enter a plea after handing himself into police last month. A lawyer representing Mackenzie, George Kariuki, has said the self-styled pastor is cooperating with investigators.
Magistrate Yusuf Shikanda said at a hearing in the port city of Mombasa that Mackenzie and 17 other people detained in connection with the mass deaths would not be granted bail because of concerns that their release would jeopardize investigations.
“Being aware of the respondents’ right to be presumed innocent until the contrary is proved, I find that there is reasonable suspicion that the respondents may have committed the offenses under investigation,” Shikanda said.
Wycliffe Makasembo, a lawyer for Mackenzie and his wife, who is also detained, said he would appeal against the decision.
“The ruling was not within the law. It violates the constitutional rights of our clients,” Makasembo said.
Mackenzie was arrested earlier this year on suspicion of the murder of two children by starvation and suffocation, but was then released on bail.
Relatives of his adherents say that after he was freed, he returned to Shakahola forest and brought forward his predicted world’s end date — which had previously fallen in August — to April 15.
Mackenzie surrendered to police on April 14 after police first raided the forest where the Good News International Church was based, rescuing 15 people who had been starving themselves.
Kenya court denies bail for alleged death cult leader
https://arab.news/6hhta
Kenya court denies bail for alleged death cult leader
- Paul Mackenzie, leader of the Good News International Church, not yet required to enter a plea after handing himself into police last month
Venezuela’s acting president calls for oil industry reforms to attract more foreign investment
- In her speech, Rodríguez said money earned from foreign oil sales would go into two funds: one dedicated to social services for workers and the public health care system, and another to economic development and infrastructure projects
CARACAS, Venezuela: Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodriguez used her first state of the union address on Thursday to promote oil industry reforms that would attract foreign investment, an objective aggressively pushed by the Trump administration since it toppled the country’s longtime leader less than two weeks ago.
Rodríguez, who has been under pressure from the US to fall in line with its vision for the oil-rich nation, said sales of Venezuelan oil would go to bolster crisis-stricken health services, economic development and other infrastructure projects.
While she sharply criticized the Trump administration and said there was a “stain on our relations,” the former vice president also outlined a distinct vision for the future between the two historic adversaries, straying from her predecessors, who have long railed against American intervention in Venezuela.
“Let us not be afraid of diplomacy” with the US, said Rodriguez, who must now navigate competing pressures from the Trump administration and a government loyal to former President Nicolás Maduro.
The speech, which was broadcast on a delay in Venezuela, came one day after Rodríguez said her government would continue releasing prisoners detained under Maduro in what she described as “a new political moment” since his ouster.
Trump on Thursday met at the White House with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, whose political party is widely considered to have won 2024 elections rejected by Maduro. But in endorsing Rodríguez, who served as Maduro’s vice president since 2018, Trump has sidelined Machado.
In her speech, Rodríguez said money earned from foreign oil sales would go into two funds: one dedicated to social services for workers and the public health care system, and another to economic development and infrastructure projects.
Hospitals and other health care facilities across the country have long suffered. Patients are asked to provide practically all supplies needed for their care, from syringes to surgical screws. Economic turmoil, among other factors, has pushed millions of Venezuelans to migrate from the South American nation in recent years.
In moving forward, the acting president must walk a tightrope, balancing pressures from both Washington and top Venezuelan officials who hold sway over Venezuela’s security forces and strongly oppose the US Her recent public speeches reflect those tensions — vacillating from conciliatory calls for cooperation with the US, to defiant rants echoing the anti-imperialist rhetoric of her toppled predecessor.
American authorities have long railed against a government they describe as a “dictatorship,” while Venezuela’s government has built a powerful populist ethos sharply opposed to US meddling in its affairs.
For the foreseeable future, Rodríguez’s government has been effectively relieved of having to hold elections. That’s because when Venezuela’s high court granted Rodríguez presidential powers on an acting basis, it cited a provision of the constitution that allows the vice president to take over for a renewable period of 90 days.
Trump enlisted Rodríguez to help secure US control over Venezuela’s oil sales despite sanctioning her for human rights violations during his first term. To ensure she does his bidding, Trump threatened Rodríguez earlier this month with a “situation probably worse than Maduro.”
Maduro, who is being held in a Brooklyn jail, has pleaded not guilty to drug-trafficking charges.
Before Rodríguez’s speech on Thursday, a group of government supporters was allowed into the presidential palace, where they chanted for Maduro, who the government insists remains the country’s president. “Maduro, resist, the people are rising,” they shouted.
