Families of Mucwini victims want reparation

SOURCE: The Monitor

By James Eriku

Families who lost their dear ones in Mucwini massacre in Kitgum District at the peak of the Lord’s Resistance Army rebellion in 2002 have asked the government to consider compensating them for the loss.

The bereaved relatives said it is through compensation that they would feel government’s commitment in redressing the plight of children and women orphaned and widowed by the raid.

“We ask the government to join hands with the cultural institution to compensate the families of those who died, to foster reconciliation and healing,” a statement read by the victims during a memorial prayer at the weekend, reads in part.

In the early morning of July 24, 2002, the village witnessed one of the bloodiest attacks by the LRA on civilians when 56 people were massacred.
The women and children were massacred as a deliberate act of retaliation by the rebel outfit.

This is after they claimed that one of the sons of the village who had been abducted escaped and returned to the area with their gun.
The rebels allegedly rounded up the community and randomly selected some of the friends and family members to be murdered by axes, hand hoes, machetes and logs.

Unfair act
They said although they appreciate government’s efforts to compensate lives of people killed by the July 11, 2010 twin bomb blasts in Kampala and those killed in Mukura massacre in 1989, they are not happy that there is no attention directed to survivors of the massacre in Mucwini.

The most affected parishes in Mucwini by the LRA raids were; Pajong, Yepa, Pubec, Pudo, Ogwapoke, Agwoko, Akara and Bura.

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