Present-day child sacrifice

While in Kampala I had a brief chat with Shane, the 'head of ops' shall we say at Come, Let's Dance. She was telling me how that week she had been invited to attend a meeting of Parliament & to be part of a press conference talking about this new law being proposed to end child sacrifice! Here's what she had to say about it:

Last Monday I was asked to go to Parliament and be a key spokesperson for Child sacrificing — to speak out against it and help make it a law in Uganda. Right now the President of Uganda is saying he will consider making the punishment ‘no bale’ for the person who sacrifices a child. I couldn’t believe it when they actually asked me what the law should be, what I would propose as a punishment or something to deter people from listening to the local witchdoctors and killing even their own children. WOW. So, I asked all the TV stations, radios, and Newspapers what the punishment for MURDER is...they said the death penalty or life in prison. So, I said child sacrificing IS murder, they should get the same punishment — and, can you believe that they had never thought of that?! What? So, I made Come, Let’s Dance the official NGO speaking out against child sacrificing — this Thursday we’re joining up with some other groups to march to parliament and deliver the petition asking the President to make this a law in Uganda — definitely NO bale, but also deem it murder. I was all on tv and radio and now I’m meeting the Speaker of the House. We all have t-shirts to wear and taking all the taxis full of college kids and such to make a statement — they’ll love it! Meanwhile, we’re living out Psalm 82 and defending the cause of the weak, fighting the wicked and injustice! Amen.

Yes...it is still happening & yes, it is mind-blowing to realize that its not even seen to be on the same line as murder. Here's an article that came out this week in the local Ugandan newspaper, New Vision. http://www.newvision.co.ug/D/8/13/685203

Pass law against child sacrifice quickly, Parliament told

Publication date: Thursday, 18th June, 2009

By Mary Karugaba

MPS have been called upon to quickly enact laws against child sacrifice. The request was made by a local rights’ NGO after children presented a petition to the deputy Speaker of Parliament, Rebecca Kadaga, yesterday.

The children had marched through the streets of Kampala before going to Parliament. The campaign was organised by Action for the Rights of Children (ARC) and the Uganda Parliamentary Forum for Children.

“We condemn this act, as well as the perpetrators, and ask Parliament to come up with laws criminalising child sacrifice,” the children said in the petition by Ingrid Naiga of Green Hill Academy.

In the petition, also signed by Penny Baziga, the ARC director and Rebecca Lukwago, the MP for Luweero, the children said the perpetrators of the crime were aiming at getting rich quickly.

“Children are the future leaders. Witchdoctors have no right to kill them. When they do so, it means, there would be no leaders and, therefore, no development,” Sharon Kyomuhendo from Mukono Boarding Primary school said.

The children cited Police statistics stating that at least 18 ritual murder cases were reported in 2008, but only 15 had been probed.

They also said close to 3,000 children disappear from home annually, adding that they could have been sacrificed.

The petitioners urged the Government to set up special courts to try perpetrators of the crime and to develop a standard code of conduct for traditional healers.

They also called for the establishment of a unit within the Police Force to check child sacrifice. Kadaga promised to forward the petition to Parliament within two weeks.