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| (Vanessa O'Brien) |
Pentecostal
Bishop Umar Mulinde has become well-known in Uganda since converting from Islam
to Christianity. His campaign against the introduction of Islamic courts in
Uganda resulted in him suffering a brutal acid attack last year. Now in Israel
for treatment, his body may be broken and suffering, but his mind and spirit
are strong.
With a
low-tipped cowboy hat and pink-flesh coloured compression mask covering his
face, Umar Mulinde (38) moves gingerly across a Tel Aviv hotel lobby, sheltered
from the scorching Israeli sun. Exhaustion overwhelms him as he finally sits
down after his daily journey to Sheba Hospital, where he is being treated for
the deep acid burns that scar the right side of his face.
It’s hard
to believe this is Uganda’s firebrand Bishop of the Pentecostal Gospel Life
Church International, who can be seen energetically preaching in a variety of
YouTube videos. Speaking with unwavering conviction, he says “the people who
did this to me, they thought they are serving God. But I feel sorry for them
and I forgive them because they didn’t know what they were doing.”
Allah Akbar
Mulinde was
attacked on Christmas Eve 2011 in Namasuba, 10 kilometres from Kampala, right
outside his church and directly opposite a police station. Two men approached
and threw an unidentified acid directly at his face. “As I was opening the door
of my car, one poured a bucket of acid on my head,” Mulinde recalls. “I felt
fire from my head down to my toes.”
As he
toppled over, the second attacker poured acid over his back. Acid burned
through the metal of Mulinde’s car. His last memory of the assault was hearing
the words “Allah Akbar” echoing three times. He thought he was going to die.
Fatwa
Mulinde is
a well-known public figure in Uganda, notably because he is an apostate. He’s a
former Muslim sheikh, the grandson of an imam, who converted to Christianity on
Easter Sunday in 1993. From that time forward, says Mulinde, even his own
brothers wouldn’t greet him in the street.
But it
wasn’t until he led a group of Christian leaders to petition Parliament in
April 2011 that a fatwa was issued against his life. They were calling for a
temporary halt to the introduction of the Muslim Personal Law Bill. It aims to
put into effect Article 129 of the Ugandan Constitution, providing for the
establishment of official Islamic courts to dispense justice to Uganda’s
Muslims under sharia law.
“We even
told the government that if they do it and go ahead we will sue them,” Mulinde
says passionately, while adjusting the dark glasses that cover his one good eye
and the one doctors were unable to save. “We will take it to the court of law
because if Uganda is 85 percent Christian, and we have never asked for
Christian laws in the constitution, how do you put Muslim laws in the
constitution? The constitution says Uganda is a secular state.”
Not only
for Muslims
The Ugandan
Muslim Centre for Justice and Law (UMCJL) is once again pushing for the
legalisation of the sharia Kadhi courts, which currently operate ad-hoc. UMCJL
president Jaffer Senganda, who knows Mulinde personally, told Radio Netherlands
Worldwide that he doubts Muslims were involved in the acid attack on the
Bishop. He says the Christian opposition in Uganda fears that Kadhi courts
would have jurisdiction in criminal matters, which isn’t true. Mulinde
counter-argues that the Christian population’s fears are validated by Nigeria’s
example. “They said, ‘This is for Muslims’ but they end up applying it to
everybody.”
Hope
Although
Mulinde was raised to hate Israel as a Muslim, he had a change of heart when he
converted to Christianity. He has brought several groups of Ugandan pilgrims to
the Holy Land and established friendships in the Jewish community. Sheba
Hospital’s burn unit, which has experience dealing victims of terrorism, is
treating him for free.
“He has a
long way to go,” says Sheba Hospital spokesman David Weinberg, “but his story
is one that played on our hearts.” Mulinde’s doctor Haik Yosef says while the
physical damage is “severe and deep”, his future prognosis is good. “Some
people get small scars and become depressed, but sometimes even such a severe
burn like Umar’s won’t change his character or his perception of everything. I
think he will do just fine.”
The attack
has not deterred Mulinde: he is still fighting the establishment of Kadhi
courts, and will continue his campaign when he returns to Uganda in several
months time. But first, he has three more surgeries and skin grafts to endure.
(Subjects: Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Muhammad, Jesus, God, Jews, Arabs, EU, US, Israel, Iran, Russia, Africa, South America, Global Unity,..... etc.) (Text version)
" ..... If an Arab and a Jew can look at one another and see the Akashic lineage and see the one family, there is hope. If they can see that their differences no longer require that they kill one another, then there is a beginning of a change in history. And that's what is happening now. All of humanity, no matter what the spiritual belief, has been guilty of falling into the historic trap of separating instead of unifying. Now it's starting to change. There's a shift happening. ....."
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