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http://morningstarnews.org/2015/01/imam-in-uganda-beats-daughter-to-death-for-converting-to-christ/5
Also Via Human Rights Without Frontiers
Uganda -
Imam Allegedly Beats Daughter to Death for Converting to Christianity
21 January 2015 -
NAIROBI, Kenya (Morning Star News) – A 12-year-old girl who was hospitalized
for two weeks after her Muslim father beat her and her sister for converting to
Christ last month is traumatized after learning that her sister died from the
assault, sources said.
Naigaga Saidah’s
father, Imam Abudalah Ali of Bwita mosque in Kaliro District, allegedly beat to
death her 15-year-old sister, Namugonya Jamirah, on Dec. 11 after the sisters
put their trust in Christ at a five-day evangelistic event that ended that day.
Beaten unconscious, Naigaga did not learn of her sister’s death until a pastor
had transferred her to safety in another town on Jan. 7, sources said.
Portion of Imam
Abudalah Ali’s statement disowning his daughter for conversion to Christ.
(Morning Star New)
“Saidah needs
prayers, trauma counseling and medication for the left side of her hip that was
injured by the father,” a source whose name is withheld for security reasons
told Morning Star News.
After the Dec.
7-11 evangelistic campaign at Bwita trading center in the Nakibungulya area of
Kaliro District, a neighbor told Ali that his daughters had become Christians,
sources said. That afternoon, 17 Muslims arrived at the venue of the
evangelistic meeting, but the participants had left, a source said.
“Their father got
the information that his daughters have converted, and he organized a small
group of fellow Muslims, about 17 people, to go and attack the Christians,” a
source said. “He found the campaign had finished but went back to his home and
waited for the daughters. When they went back home, the father picked up the
club and started beating them badly till one called Jamirah died.”
Saidah managed to
escape when her father went inside the house to look for water to splash her
back to consciousness, the source said. She arrived limping in blood-stained
clothes at a pastor’s house.
The following day
the pastor and another Christian leader went to Ali’s home, learned that
Jamirah was dead and reported it to police. Officers arrived at Ali’s house on
Dec. 12 and arrested him. He was charged with murder but denied it, claiming
that Jamirah died from a motorcycle accident.
His wife and two
sons supported his statement, and Ali was released on bail on Dec. 13. The same
day, Ali officially disowned Saidah for leaving Islam for Christianity before a
Kaliro Local Council official.
Saidah described
her ordeal to Morning Star News by phone.
“My father took
us to the house and then locked the house,” she said. “He questioned us why we
attended a Christian meeting and started beating us up with a club. My sister
was hit on the forehead and fell down. I tried to hide myself in the bed, but
he got me out and began beating me up as my sister lay down bleeding.”
Saidah began
shouting for help, but her father covered her mouth with such force that she
nearly suffocated, she said. She fell down, unconscious.
“Later on I
realized that my clothes were soaked with water as I regained my consciousness,
and my father had left,” she said. “I got up and went to the pastor’s house,
which is about 30 minutes’ walk. I arrived there at 7 p.m.”
The pastor took
her to a medical clinic, where she was treated for two weeks, while her father
began organizing area Muslims to kill her, sources said. The pastor sent her to
a Christian leader in another undisclosed town on Jan. 7. When Saidah learned
then that her sister had died, she fainted and remained another two days in a
nearby hospital.
“The police were
later bribed and accepted the words of Ali, and he was released on bail,” one
source said. “When he came home he went to the [local] chairman and said
that he had disowned Saidah, and that if she tries to go back that she will be
killed just like her sister, and that he is leaving Saidah in the hands of
born-again Christians.”
The chairman
summoned the Christian leaders and informed them of what Ali had told him. They
told Ali to put his decision to disown her in writing.
“Saidah has been traumatized, is still limping; and she is in a
need of counseling, medical support, and school fees, because she is
going to primary seventh grade this year,” he said.