Twelve-year-old Joseph Kasirye never made it to the village well after leaving his home in Kayugi in southern Uganda.
As he walked to fetch water on Oct. 27 last year he was hit on the head with a hoe, allegedly by a man he knew — Umar Katerega, the local witch doctor.
His head and genitals were then cut off and given to property tycoon Godfrey Kato Kajubi who, according to police, wanted to guarantee the success of his latest development the only way he knew how: by burying the parts under a mansion under construction.
Ugandans have been gripped by the details of the macabre tale involving a rich businessman, a poor boy and a witch doctor and his accomplice out to make themselves wealthy. But there is a troubling familiarity in this country with the practice at its core: child sacrifice.
A surge of cases in the past three years has made the gruesome news of ritual murders shockingly routine. Joseph’s was just one of 25 confirmed by the Ugandan Police Force in 2008.
A list of some of the ritual murders is shocking for its similarities: Ismael Ssekajja, nine — beheaded; James Wanzaale, 12 — beheaded; Patrick Makonzi, 12 — beheaded; Bwenge, seven– private parts and heart missing; Esther Among, a student –beheaded.
Police have also recorded more than 300 child abuductions in the same period, many of them unsolved, leading to fears the real number of child sacrifices may be much higher. Police said most of the ritual murders were committed by parents or relatives.
In February, police responded to the wave of murders by setting up a national committee devoted to the investigation of child sacrifice reports.
In the case of Joseph, Mr. Kajubi had allegedly promised the witch doctor $6,000 for a boy’s head. In the end, an upfront payment of closer to $200 was enough to get the job done in a country where average annual income sits below $400.
“Here in Africa, many believe that in order to get rich, you need to sacrifice for it,” said Mubatsi Asinja Habati, a crime reporter with The Independent, a Ugandan newspaper. “For the most unscrupulous people, they look at human beings as the ultimate sacrifice.”
This is a country arguably best known for Idi Amin’s brutal regime, believed to have cost up to 300,000 Ugandan lives. In the 1980s, the Lord’s Resistance Army began a guerrilla rebellion that continues to this day and now a new blight threatens to taint the country’s reputation.
“In almost every corner of the country, you hear people are really disturbed by [child sacrifice],” said Betty Ocan, an MP representing the Gulu district in the north of the country who is also a member of the Uganda Parliamentary Forum for Children.
A passion for children brought Timothy Opobo to the country’s African Network for the Prevention and Protection Against Child Abuse and Neglect four years ago. He has seen ritual murder shoot towards the top of his agenda.
He says witch doctors have capitalized on a trend toward traditional medical practices, convincing desperate clients to do anything in order to lift a perceived curse.
“Witch doctors call themselves traditional healers and publicize their activities in the newspaper and on the radio,” he said. “More people are accessing their services and more people are brainwashed to believe that to get rich, you have to sacrifice a child.”
According to Mr. Opobo, the problem has been compunded by a recent ban on traditional healers in Tanzania. Uganda’s southern border is shared with Tanzania, making it a natural destination for exiled practitioners.
Dr. Yahaya Sekagya, director of the Ugandan chapter of the Association for the Promotion of Traditional Medicine, agrees that some unsavoury elements are tainting his profession.
“We need to dissociate with child sacrifice because it is not part of our traditional healing. That infiltration is destroying our culture,” he said.
According to Mr. Opobo, the country needs a law that addresses child sacrifice directly to ensure all involved are properly punished. A Witchcraft Act already exists, dating from colonial days, but it has fallen into disuse and makes no mention of child sacrifice.
“More perpetrators must be found guilty. Let people know there is a penalty for this and that will act as a deterrent,” he said.
Ms. Ocan explained that the circumstances of a child sacrifice can create doubt over the charge levelled.
“Sometimes the witch doctors do the sacrifice themselves. But sometimes, it’s done by other people and the witch doctors take what they need from the bodies of the victims. That is really murder and such people should face that charge,” she said.
Last month, Save the Children, together with Mr. Opobo’s organization and other groups, marched on the parliamentary building in Kampala to protest child sacrifice and call for witchcraft to be stamped out.
The country’s President, Yoweri Museven, has also called publicly for the death penalty for perpetrators of child sacrifice.
In the meantime, Mr. Opobo has his sights set on education for children and parents that he hopes will reduce cases of child sacrifice by demystifying traditional healing practices.
According to Mr. Habati, the local media has already made its own small contribution.
“Since our stories brought attention to this subject, many parents have taken their children to get ear piercings and circumcisions, because witch doctors consider these mutilations and will not accept those children’s bodies,” he said.
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black culture. this is why we have black crime out of control in the civilized world. these savages have violence in their very dna. too bad hitler tried to rid us of jews insread of africans.