Uganda: mother loses two children to ritual murder

‘Ndyakundwa is confused. She wants justice for her children yet people involved are her family members.’

The involvement of relatives in ritualistic killings goes back to the origin of the age-old practice of human sacrifices, nowadays widely condemned. There is no place for it in the 21st century. ‘Thou shalt not kill‘. The law must take its course. (webmaster FVDK)

Mother loses two to ritual murder

Ndyakundwa at her house in Kibuye, Vuga. She says her children were killed by her relatives

Published: August 3, 2020
By: Glorias Musiime – New Vision, Uganda

MUBENDE- A woman in Kibuye Vuga, Mubende district, says she lost two children in a period of four months to ritual murder last year.

In her statement to the Police at Kiganda in Mubende, Monica Ndyakundwa said her children were killed by her relatives led by her father.

New Vision found Ndyakundwa grazing cattle for a Good Samaritan, who gave her a place to live in after she lost her home.

“I have nowhere else to go. When residents suspected my father and brother of killing my children, they destroyed our house. My father and brother fled and they were arrested later,” she says.

She now stays in a makeshift grass structure only big enough to accommodate two people. Ndyakundwa says her 75-year old father did not act alone.

“There were other two men who could have connived with him to kill my children,” she says.

Her tribulations started when they were still living in Busobwera, Mubende district in May, last year. One morning, her five-year-old son went missing from a house she was sharing with her father Steven Kagyenda and her brother Geoffrey Tagaywa.

Residents banish family

After three days of searching for the boy, residents called off the search and a village meeting banished the family from the area on suspicion of being involved in the disappearance and possible murder of their child.

Kagyenda, a cattle keeper, relocated to Mabare in Kiganda sub-county, about 30km from Busobwera. Being new in the area, neighbours gave them food until they settled down.

Four months later, Ndyakundwa’s other seven-year-old son also disappeared.

“After a search, the boy’s body was found three days later in a plastic drum near our home,” she narrates.

Residents again suspected Kagyenda, whose story of a similar incident in Busobwera was well known.

Kagyenda and the son fled for fear of being lynched by the angry residents. An angry mob destroyed the house and chased the family, including Ndyakundwa, from the village.

A neighbour says she woke up to dig behind her main house and was shocked to find a dead body of a child in a drum near her compound.

“I suspected it was Kagyenda’s grandchild because he was missing. But when I rushed to tell him, Kagyenda was not moved.

He seemed unbothered. He only asked me if the child was dead or alive. He did not even try to find out,” she says.

She made an alarm which attracted residents. According to the investigating officer, Charles Ngobi, the body was dismembered and legs, tongue and chin were missing.

A report says blood was scooped from the body. Ndyakundwa says the second incident convinced her that her father was involved in the murder of her children.

“That night when my son disappeared, we had received visitors; two men who came from Sembabule. They left early at 4:30am. I suspect those two men connived with my father to murder my child,” she says.

The Police at Kiganda arrested Kagyenda, his son Tagaywa and four others; Kato David, Kellen Kembabazi, Sam Kato and Nyakojo on murder charges. They appeared in court in Mubende.

However, the Police in Kassanda says only Kato and Nyakojo are still being held on murder charges. The other suspects were released for lack of evidence.

The Police fear that Ndyakundwa could be hurt by her family members to kill the evidence.

They say she needed to be protected and that is why they brought her to Kibuye, Vuga.

Source: Mother loses two to ritual murder

Mubende District, Uganda