Uganda: Muslim husband murders wife and children for their faith in Christ

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – A Muslim man in Kayunga, Uganda is understood to have murdered his wife and two children by strangulation and hanging because his spouse and eight-year-old child received Christ following Christmas worship services last month, Morning Star News (MSN) reports. Although Muslims are a minority in Uganda, Christians in the country have been increasingly vulnerable to violent attacks by Islamic extremists.

Shamira Nakato, 27, and her two children, ages 3 and 8, were found hanged in their home in Bwetyaba village, Kayunga District on December 28, ICC reports. Nakato and her oldest child had accepted Christ two days earlier, after a neighbor invited them to services on December 25, and again on December 26 and 27.

“At the end of the service [on December 25], Nakato remained behind and told me that she had a deep conviction to embrace Christ after the prayer of Christmas Day,” the pastor, whose name is withheld for security reasons, told MSN. “I then prayed for her and invited her for a special prayer day on Monday, December 27.” Nakato’s 8-year-old child also received Christ, the pastor said.

However, while Nakato was at church on December 27, her husband Hamidu Kasimbi stormed into the service, having been told where she was by a Muslim neighbor. “When he entered the church, his wife and the children were seated at the back,” the pastor told MSN. “He pulled her out of the church, and about 100 meters away, a member saw him beat his wife.”

Later that day, screaming was heard from Kasimbi’s house and a neighbor saw two men wearing Islamic prayer caps building a wooden structure outside, MSN reports. Further screaming was heard in the middle of the night and, on December 28, a neighbor attended the house and found Nakota and both children hanged. Police from Bukaloto police station were called, and the bodies were taken to Kayunga Hospital for postmortem, MSN was told. Kasimbi has disappeared, and police are looking for him in connection with the deaths, which have been registered as a homicide.

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