Residents of Gituamba village, Kaiti sub location in Gatero location of Laikipia West Constituency were left speechless after a prominent evangelist John Paul Muriithi popularly known as Apostle John Paul exhumed the remains of his mother for reburial elsewhere.
He said he took the action after relatives of his mother – the late Lucy Wanja Mwangi- demanded that her remains be removed from the family land she was buried in late 2021.
The Apostle who heads Judah Altar of Victory Church, is the eldest child of the deceased who died aged 60 years.
“I want to go and bury her in another place after I was asked by her relatives to take the body from here. The body will be reburied in my farm in Matuu, Machakos County in a week.
Public Health Officer Daniel Kahoro and area Senior Assistant Chief Beatrice Wainehe supervised Monday’s exhumation exercise while five armed police officers provided security although the exercise was incident free.
The grave containing the remains of Wanja was one of the five graves at one section of the land.
The exhumation exercise, which was backed by a court order issued by a Nyahururu court, attracted curious neighbours who thronged the graveyard area to witness the rare occurrence.
The Assistant Chief said it was the first exhumation in the location and urged families to be carrying out extensive consultations before burials to avoid such incidents.
The Apostle arrived in the village in a convoy of vehicles, including a hearse for carrying the body manned by two female morticians.
He uprooted the cross from the grave, giving way to hired locals to scoop soil to reach the body. Faithful from the Apostle’s church and friends who accompanied him sang hymns continuously as the scooping of soil from the grave went on.
Once the body was put in the hearse, a banana was planted in the empty grave as per the dictates of Kikuyu cultural norms.
A neighbour said the matter was connected to land because the relatives of the deceased thought by being buried there, her children have a right to claim a share of the farm.
Kenyans came to know the Apostle when he went public appealing for help to battle colon cancer.
By Antony Mwangi
