By the time the Catholic Bishop of Masaka, Serverus Jjumba, authored a one-page communication that forced Ugandan security forces to concede that they had arbitrarily detained Catholic clergy Deusdedit Ssekabira, the army had detained him for 10 days without admission.
According to people who witnessed the abduction of Fr Ssekabira, a curate of Bamangi Parish in Masaka, this operation followed a similar template that the Special Forces Command (SFC) have since 2019 used to abduct Opposition ‘foot soldiers’ who belong to the National Unity Platform (NUP).
Indeed, Bishop Jjumba said Fr Ssekabira had been kidnapped by army men who were in a Toyota Hiace, alias Drone, which has earned notoriety for being a symbol of torture and State-orchestrated disappearances.
The abduction of Ssekabira, which comes at the height of electioneering ahead of the 2026 polls, coupled with the army’s official explanation that he was picked off the streets because he was engaged in what they term as subversive activities, has once again brought into sharp focus the fading relationship between the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) government and the Catholic Church.
Throughout his nearly 40-year hold on power, Museveni, an Anglican, has repeatedly warned against the mixing of politics and religion. During the celebration of Uganda Martyrs Day, mid this year, Museveni once again made it clear that religious leaders should restrict themselves to spiritual matters.
‘Politics is about welfare on earth, and religion is about spirituality here on earth and life after in heaven, which aspects the religious leaders can speak better about,’ Museveni said.
Double standards?
Yet Museveni seems to have no problem when religious leaders have campaigned for him, with Sheikh Shaban Mubajje, a leader of a faction of Muslims that is recognised by the State, being his leading campaigner.
‘All the development you see that benefits Muslims from mosques, schools, hospitals, and the general respect and recognition has been possible because of President Museveni’s support,’ Mubajje said in October during a Uganda Muslim Supreme Council (UMSC) Executive Committee meeting.
Mubajje, whose tenure has been riddled with scandals, added: ‘If the NRM says its goal is to protect the gains, then know that Muslim progress is among those gains.’
For the Church of Uganda, retired Anglican Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi endorsed Museveni when the 80-year-old President was traversing West Nile hunting for votes. ‘We have recorded peace in this country, we have recorded growth and several other developments in this country; and yet Uganda is still a needy country,’ retired Bishop Orombi said, adding that thanks to Museveni, Ugandans can enjoy sleep in their houses.
‘On behalf of the people of Nebbi, I ask God to continue to lead you through the nation as you speak to the people, giving you health, strength and enabling you to accomplish your mission,’ Orombi, who reigned as the archbishop of the Church of Uganda between 2004 and 2007, said.
Yet there is no agreed position in the Anglican Church, with Rev Can Augustine Magala Musiwuufu, the retired dean of Namirembe Cathedral, pointing out earlier this year during a sermon that Anglican leaders need to speak out against injustices committed by the regime instead of focusing on handouts like four-wheel vehicles they get from government.
‘Speak about what is happening in the country, whether good or evil. These pictures we see on social media paint a different picture of this country,’ Musiwuufu said.
Frosty relations
If Orombi presented the rosy picture about Uganda under Museveni’s leadership, the Catholic Church doesn’t share the same. Relations with the NRM regime appear not to have thawed ever since the Catholic Church was accused of backing Robert Kyagulanyi’s presidential bid in 2021.
In fact, NRM cadres have attributed the party’s blood bath in Buganda to the backing the Catholic Church gave to Kyagulanyi, a Catholic, and his party. For instance, when Vincent Bamulangaki Ssempiija lost his Kalungu East slot to NUP’s Francis Katabaazi Katongole, he blamed the Catholic Church for his failure.
‘On voting day, a priest who led the queue for voters turned around after ticking and demonstrated how to tick to the rest of the voters among the 10 presidential candidates,’ Ssempijja explained his loss.
‘The priest, after getting his ballot paper, faced the voters, raised his hands and made a sign of the cross. How could I win? The priest influenced people on who to vote for.’ Ssempijja wasn’t the only NRM member who blamed the Catholic Church or the Buganda Kingdom for losses suffered.
‘In Buganda, it’s clear that the Mengo and the Catholic Church were involved. They were telling people to vote for the red coffee that had matured. What does that mean? We are now going into the politics of tribalism, sectarianism, and religion. The Catholic Church has come out to decampaign the government,’ Esther Mbayo, then minister for Presidency, said.
Additionally, Haruna Kasolo, the Minister of State in-charge of Microfinance, blamed his loss in Kyotera County on John Paul Lukwago Mpalanyi, then a member of the Democratic Party (DP), but who has since decamped to NUP, on the Catholic Church.
Those who are familiar with Kyotera politics say Mpalanyi was able to end Kasolo’s two-term reign in Kyotera, thanks to the backing of the Catholic Church, with top clergy and lay readers in the area openly backing what they termed as ‘one of their own.’
Bishop Kiwanuka dossier
Kyagulanyi’s push for the presidency, in a country whose leadership has been dominated by Anglicans, presents the Catholic Church with a conundrum that they faced in the colonial times. This was when one of their own, Benedicto Kagimu Kiwanuka, a member of DP, emerged as one of the prospective leaders of post-colonial Uganda.
Particularly, Bishop Joseph Kiwanuka, one of the mentors of Benedicto, was caught between a rock and a hard place. In their book titled Contesting Catholics: Benedicto Kiwanuka and the Birth of Postcolonial Uganda, Jonathon Earle and James Jay Carney, through Benedicto, tried to depict DP as by no means a Catholic Party by widening the net to incorporate Muslims and Anglicans, albeit with limited success; the Catholic clergy always found themselves in a tricky position.
With so many Catholics joining DP’s sworn enemies Kabaka Yekka and frequent political violence committed against DP Catholics, Earle and Carney say Bishop Kiwanuka, who had been appointed by the Vatican as the archbishop of Kampala, was forced to issue a pastoral letter to fellow Catholics titled ‘Church and State: Guiding Principles.’
Issued on November 23, 1961, Earle and Carney explain that Bishop Kiwanuka’s dossier turned out to be the most controversial Catholic pastoral letter in modern Uganda. The duo explain that Bishop Kiwanuka began the circular by lamenting the wounded Catholic neighbours who had approached him.
‘For the archbishop, their injuries had stemmed from their opponents’ convictions that ‘you are a traitor to the Kabaka to your country’,’ Earle and Carney explain, adding that Archbishop Kiwanuka noted that not all Catholics were, but only those who supported DP.
‘Even Archbishop Kiwanuka himself had been verbally accosted, accused with other bishops of being ‘the people who don’t want Buganda to receive what belongs to her’ and of underwriting DP movement. ‘What are you, bishops, looking for here? You don’t like the Kabaka! Wait until tomorrow and go to welcome Benedicto.’
Ssemogerere broadside
Currently, with the State-sponsored abductions not leaving out the clergy, the Catholic Church, just like in colonial times, finds itself in a position where it has to make its voice heard.
‘Who doesn’t know the reason why the people who are currently ruling us went to the bush? The sad thing is that rigging of votes has become endemic. Even the President has been mourning over this practice. He claims the Opposition rigs votes, more so in Buganda. The President isn’t a lone ranger in decrying rigging elections, even the Opposition is crying over the same thing,’ explained Archbishop of Kampala Paul Ssemogerere.
The Catholic prelate also cited a song that he said he no longer listens to, but the artist was telling Museveni that conditions that compelled him to go to the Luweero jungles to wage guerrilla war have resurfaced.
‘Those who are responsible need to hear the voice of the people because the voice of the people is the voice of God. We need to get real peace by welcoming Jesus Christ in our hearts,’ Archbishop Ssemogerere said.
He cited the New Testament in John 14:27, in which Jesus Christ said the peace he gives, the world cannot give.
‘Many times, those who are escorted by heavy security don’t have real peace in their hearts. They are even scared of their own shadows, and that is why they always use a lot of force to eliminate those who threaten their hold on power. We can only get real peace if we receive Christ in our hearts,’ he said.
Archbishop Ssemogerere’s predecessor, Cyprian Kizito Lwanga, who died in 2021, once warned the State against abductions, saying that those who are now in power claimed they were the preserve of the Idi Amin regime.
‘I remember when the NRM came to power, the President said they came to resist the politics of the Idi Amin and Milton Obote regimes. If this is still the National Resistance Movement, I call upon your government to continue resisting the evil abductions, torture and killings of people,’ Lwanga said.
Yet in his communication announcing the abduction of Fr Ssekabira, Bishop Jjumba pointed out that the abduction reminds the Catholic faithful of the way Catholic clergy Clement Mukasa was disappeared during Amin’s era, never to be seen again.
‘I’m doing this communication in our Lady of Sorrows, Kitovu Cathedral, where on 12 July 1976, Msgr Clement Mukasa was kidnapped and has never been seen again,’ Bishop Jjumba said.