By Sam Caleb Opio
Police in Kamuli district have intensified their manhunt for three assailants whom they say waylaid and killed a pastor at the weekend.
Edward Buyagwe, 45, the Pastor of Lulyambuzi Pentecostal Church, Wankole, and also the LC2 Chairperson of Lulyambuzi Parish, Wankole Sub-county, Kamuli District, was reportedly waylaid on January 27 at around 9:30 pm as he returned from escorting a visitor
Busoga North Police Region Spokesperson, Michael Kasadha, said they have mounted a manhunt for three key suspects namely to aid in the murder investigation.
“Preliminary investigations indicate that the deceased was an LC2 chairperson and Pastor. He was waylaid by assailants who cut him on the neck but he managed to run to his home where he collapsed in the courtyard,” Kasadha said on Monday.
He added: “His family and neighbours responded by rushing him to a clinic in Bubale Trading Centre where he was pronounced dead on arrival.”
According to Kasadha, Police visited the crime scene, took the body for an autopsy and authorised his burial which is scheduled for Wednesday (tomorrow).
“We ask the public to remain calm, volunteer leads in relation to the murder, so that we apprehend the assailants to answer charges,” Kasadha said.
Motive
Asuman Basoga, the Buwala LC1 chairman, theorises that the deceased’s murder was due to his continued fight against land grabbers in Wankole and Nawanyago sub-counties, whose signature he often refused to append on land sale agreements.
Bishop Eddy Munene, the newly-consecrated overseer of Busoga Region Fellowship of Born Again Pentecostal Churches, described the pastor’s murder as a “cowardly reaction”, before eulogising the deceased as a “dedicated, and open-spoken Church minister”.
Edson Wabita, a brother to the deceased, said the fallen pastor always insinuated that as long as he was still in leadership, he would die protecting the poor against “manipulation”, adding: “So, it is no surprise that evil men have claimed his life.”
The deceased is survived by a wife and eight children.
