Rongo church followers detained for 30 days

Controversy surrounding St Joseph Mission Messiah of Africa Church has taken a fresh twist after a court ordered the police to detain the 57 members who were rescued, for 30 days.

Rongo Resident Magistrate Susan Mutava said this will give police more time to complete investigations. Moments after the court session, the congregants burst into songs and praise inside a police lorry ferrying them to various police stations where they would be held.

But as this happened, desperate relatives keen to reunite with their kin who had disappeared in the church were fraught with disappointments. Their faces bore optimism and pain in equal measure as the police lorry sped past them.

Earlier, Mboya Benjamin, the investigating officer, had sought to have the 57 members detained for 30 days to complete their investigations.

According to his affidavit, Benjamin described the church’s premises as a crime scene. He claimed that the faithful continued to be unruly despite efforts by the police to offer psycho-social support.

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Benard Achola, an advocate representing the church was aggrieved by court’s decision to detain his clients for an additional 30 days and said that he was dissatisfied with the ruling.

According to Achola, the church’s members were not a flight risk as they even complied before when they were needed to record statements at the station. “Someone who is a flight risk cannot submit themselves to the authorities,” Mr Achola said.

He termed the ruling unfair saying his clients have been in custody for three days. “There was no rescue that was done but instead police went and arrested the church members. Police are just trying to use nice words to cover up their actions. My clients have been in detention,” the lawyer argued.

He held that the rights of his clients had been violated. The advocate filed another case at the Migori High Court to revert orders that were given to close down the church. “Human beings need to be given a notice before they are evacuated from a place,” Achola said.

He claimed police had destroyed so many things at the church. Achola held that the church was duly registered and did annual returns. He said the regime where the church was registered as a company did not matter. 

This happened even as more families flocked the station with hope of reuniting with their kin who left them many years ago to join the church.

For more than 20 years, the Odira family has carried the weight of silence, confusion, and longing—searching for a brother who vanished into a faith he called Jerusalem.

This week, their hopes were reignited when Joakim Ochieng Odira resurfaced after it emerged he was among the faithful rescued from the church. Fredrick Odira, his son, told The Standard that his father left them when he was young. “He left before I could even start nursery school,” he says.

The family last saw him in 2001 shortly after he was taken to the church for prayers during a family health crisis.

What was meant to be a spiritual retreat turned into a lifelong disappearance. Since then, Joakim had remained hidden in what he describes as Jerusalem. According to them, the church is a religious settlement that is heaven on earth.

“He doesn’t call it a church. To him, it is Jerusalem and heaven,” Fredrick says.

The church, known for its isolationist practices, reportedly bars outsiders from accessing its premises. At one point, police had to intervene just to bring Joakim home for a family construction project but he disappeared again after three months.

Similarly, 69-year-old Pamela Anyango, was also searching for her granddaughter who vanished over a decade ago to seek healing.