Doctors try to save Ugandan pastor’s eye after attack

KAMPALA, Uganda — While a Ugandan pastor was fighting to retain sight in his remaining eye after an acid attack, Muslim extremists in February were shooting at his close friend, a leader of another church. 

Doctors at Sheba Hospital in Tel-Aviv, Israel, are still not sure what kind of chemicals Muslim extremists cast on Bishop Umar Mulinde of Gospel Life Church International outside of Kampala last Christmas Eve, but they know that the acid is threatening the vision in his remaining eye. Mulinde, a former sheik (Islamic teacher) who became the target of Islamic extremists after converting to Christianity in 1993, said his left eye has been getting better under the specialized treatment he has been able to receive since the attack was publicized. 

“The damaged right eye is somehow affecting the left eye,” Mulinde said. “The doctors are thinking of removing the right eye with hope of saving the left eye.” Mulinde said he was encouraged that ministry is continuing at his church in Namasuba, about six miles outside of Kampala, though his friend Zachariah Serwadda, a pastor with an Evangel Church congregation, was ambushed Feb. 4 after an evangelistic outreach in the predominantly Muslim town of Mbale. 

“I only heard several voices as I dropped down when the windshield of my vehicle got broken,” said Serwadda, who was unhurt in the attack. “It could be the same group (that attacked Mulinde). It seems it’s the same network, because after attacking Bishop Mulinde, they threw down letters at the Gospel Life Church International there threatening to attack other preachers like him.”