THE bereaved Ugandan border town of Mpondwe-Lhubiriha began burying the victims of a horrific attack on a school by suspected extremist rebels that claimed the lives of 42 people, mostly students. As security forces increased patrols along the frontier with volatile eastern Congo, the town solemnly laid to rest the victims of the brutal assault.
Selevest Mapoze, mayor of Mpondwe-Lhubiriha, announced that one of the eight people wounded in the Friday night attack, which resulted in the deaths of 38 students, passed away overnight. ‘Most of the relatives have come to take their bodies’ from the morgue, he stated.
The victims of the attack, in addition to the 38 students, include a school guard and three civilians. On Sunday, two members of the same family were buried. Some students were burned beyond recognition, while others were shot or hacked to death when militants armed with guns and machetes attacked Lhubiriha Secondary School, a co-ed and privately owned institution located near the Congo border. Ugandan authorities believe that at least six students were abducted and taken as porters back into Congo.
READ ALSO: Nigerians Groan As 7.5% VAT Pushes Petrol Prices Above N500/ Litre
Nigerian Lawmaker Dies Three Days After Inauguration
Bank Manager Commits Suicide Over Unpaid Loans
Obafemi Awolowo Varsity’s 100-level Female Student Commits Suicide
Meet Yusuf Aminat, Lady Who Broke LASU 40-Yr 5.00 CGPA Record
First Time In 17 Years: Denmark Goes Two Weeks Without Rain
UN Secretary-General António Guterres condemned the attack, emphasising the importance of collective efforts and enhanced regional partnerships to address cross-border insecurity between Congo and Uganda. Guterres called for the restoration of durable peace in the area.
In Mpondwe-Lhubiriha, the atmosphere was tense but calm on Sunday as Ugandan security forces patrolled the streets and guarded the school, which was cordoned off by the police.
The attack has been attributed to the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a group with established ties to the Islamic State. While the ADF rarely claims responsibility for its attacks, it has been accused of launching numerous assaults targeting civilians in remote areas of eastern Congo, including one in March that resulted in the deaths of 19 people.
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, in his first comment on the incident, described the attack as ‘criminal, desperate, terrorist, and futile.’ He pledged to deploy additional troops on the Ugandan side of the border. The ADF has long opposed Museveni’s rule, and the group was established in the early 1990s by Ugandan Muslims who felt marginalised by the government’s policies. Over the years, the rebels have carried out deadly attacks in Ugandan villages and even in the capital city, including a 1998 massacre of 80 students in a town not far from the recent raid.
Schools are often targeted by attackers because they are considered soft targets. Students are sometimes recruited into rebel ranks or used as carriers for insurgents. Such attacks provide media coverage that extremists covet.
The raid seems to have caught Ugandan authorities off guard, as first responders arrived after the attackers had fled. As a result, some villagers have temporarily relocated from the Mpondwe-Lhubiriha community due to fears of further attacks.
The border between Uganda and Congo is porous, with multiple unmonitored footpaths. Many parts of eastern Congo are lawless, allowing groups like the ADF to operate freely due to limited government authority. However, attacks by the ADF on the Ugandan side of the border are rare, thanks in part to the presence of Ugandan troops in the region. Since 2021, Ugandan forces have been deployed to eastern Congo as part of a military operation to hunt down ADF militants and prevent them from attacking civilians across the border.
The recent deployment of Ugandan troops inside Congo came in response to suicide bombings by suspected ADF members in Kampala, the capital, in November 2021. The bombings, near the Parliament building and a busy police station, claimed the lives of at least four civilians.
President Museveni expressed determination to eliminate the ADF terrorists, highlighting the military pressure on the rebels deep within Congolese territory. The splintering of the ADF into smaller groups, such as the one that carried out the school attack, is seen as an attempt to force Ugandan troops to withdraw and focus on defending villages in Uganda, thereby saving the militants from further losses.
‘Especially now that the Congo government allowed us to operate on the Congo side also, we have no excuse in not hunting down the ADF terrorists into extinction,’ stated President Museveni.
(With AP)
