Uganda

NAIROBI, Kenya – While a Ugandan pastor was fighting to retain sight in his remaining eye after an acid attack, Muslim extremists this month were shooting at his close friend, a leader of another church.

Doctors at Sheba Hospital in Tel-Aviv, Israel, are still not sure what kind of chemicals Muslim extremists cast on Bishop Umar Mulinde of Gospel Life Church International outside of Kampala last Christmas Eve, but they know that the acid is threatening the vision in his remaining eye.

"I am regaining my sight, though the healing progress is a bit slow," Mulinde told Compass by phone. "Doctors are still looking for ways to save it, but it seems a complicated case. The chemical was very strong, and each day it was going deeper, with pain increasing day by day; even the doctors are interested to know which type of acid it was, because it really did great damage to me." more >>

NAIROBI, Kenya – A former member of a Muslim extremist group in Uganda who converted to Christianity is in hiding in Kenya, his movements severely restricted following threats to kill him.

Hassan Sharif Lubenga, 54, was a sheikh and member of the Buk Haram, a violent group of Islamists whose name suggests the Bible is corrupt and therefore forbidden. Originally from Chengera, seven kilometers from Kampala, the husband to four wives began his conversion process four years ago; in June 2011, he said, after various dreams and visions in which Jesus appeared to him, he made a full commitment to follow Christ.

Lubenga fled to Kenya last July 10 after hostilities peaked, and upon returning to Uganda in September he received messages on his cell phone from mujahidin – Islamic fighters – threatening to kill him, he said. He reported the threats to Chengera police, who told him they would investigate, but in October a friend told him that he'd heard in a Chengera mosque that his former colleagues were enraged and planning to kill him. more >>

BWERA, Uganda – A 15-year-old Christian girl in western Uganda who lost the use of her legs after her father locked her in a room for six months for leaving Islam has begun to take tentative steps.

Susan Ithungu of Isango village, Kasese district, had been hospitalized since September 2010 after neighbors along with police rescued her from her father, Beya Baluku, who had given her hardly any food or water. He was arrested shortly afterward but quickly released. She and her younger brother, Mbusa Baluku, lived alone with their father, who was divorced from their mother.

In March 2010, Susan had trusted Christ for her salvation – prompting her father to threaten to slaughter her publicly with a knife. Pastor Joseph Baluku of Bwera Full Gospel Church in Kasese said neighbors who discovered that the girl was locked in a room with almost no food or water notified authorities. more >>

KAMPALA, Uganda – Islamic extremists threw acid on a church leader on Christmas Eve shortly after a seven-day revival at his church, leaving him with severe burns that have blinded one eye and threaten sight in the other.

Bishop Umar Mulinde, 37, a sheikh (Islamic teacher) before his conversion to Christianity, was attacked on Saturday night (Dec. 24) outside his Gospel Life Church International building in Namasuba, about 10 kilometers (six miles) outside of Kampala. From his hospital bed in Kampala, he told Compass that he was on his way back to the site for a party with the entire congregation and hundreds of new converts to Christianity when a man who claimed to be a Christian approached him.

“I heard him say in a loud voice, ‘Pastor, pastor,’ and as I made a turn and looked at him, he poured the liquid onto my face as others poured more liquid on my back and then fled away shouting, ‘Allahu akbar [God is greater],’” Mulinde said, still visibly traumatized two days after the assault. more >>

Friends, family and loved ones on two continents continued mourning four evangelical Christians killed in Uganda during a fatal car accident last Thursday. Uganda's American embassy has promised a full investigation of the crash, while sending condolences to congregations hurt by the tragedy.

"The Ugandan government is doing all it can to make our roads safer," said Dickson Ogwang, the embassy's minister counsel. "We pray that God may encourage the families and churches affected by this incident. It is very sad for our Christian community that this happened."

The accident affects both American and Ugandan congregations who lost beloved leaders as a result of the crash. Americans are mourning the death of the Rev. Leo Godzich, an associate pastor at Phoenix's First Assembly of God, and Leo Piano, a congregation member who retired from the Phoenix Police Department in March 2010 after a 25 year career. more >>

President Barack Obama put East Africa on Americans’ minds when he authorized the deployment of 100 U.S. military advisers to the region on Oct. 14. Once arrived, they’ll train militaries from an array of African nations on how they can best defeat the region’s most malicious militia group – Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).

“The LRA is a rebel group operating in Northern Uganda the last 20 years or so,” said Dickson Ogwang, the minister counsel for Uganda’s American embassy. “They have committed massive atrocities and killed huge numbers of people.”

Ogwang said Obama’s decision gives armies in Uganda, Southern Sudan, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo much needed aid. He said the advisers would provide tactical support, surveillance and expertise for troops fighting the LRA. They’d also avoid combat, he said, unless attacked first. more >>