Rising deaths in Oyam former IDP camp spark evil spirit attack fears

Ojwii Trading Centre in the northern Oyam District teems with life.

Some iron sheet-roofed permanent structures dot what was previously a constellation of grass-thatched huts, which in their whole constituted an Internally Displaced People’s (IDP) camp.

At the height of the 1987-2005 Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebellion, with its epicentre in Acholi Sub-region, residents of Abella and Ajul parishes of present-day Aleka Sub-county at the Lango-Acholi frontier found themselves in harm’s way.

So, they escaped en masse, later huddling at Ojwii. That was about a decade ago, and the IDP population then was estimated at 10, 500.

With the guns falling silent in August 2005, and LRA fighters alongside their wanted leader Joseph Kony fleeing to Garamba park in the DR Congo, thousands of locals felt relief but, with it, uncertainty about the future.

The war did not just uproot victims from the land of their ancestors, but debased their cultures too. 

Congested IDP camps in which Unicef estimated thousands died of squalid conditions, allowed neither family privacy nor parental control.

Out-of-work parents who relied on food handouts from relief agencies were unlikely to provide adequately for family and exercise control, resulting in their out-of-school children to grow deprived of decorum and formal education.

Now a decade later, the children who have grown into youths and adults like no work, but alcohol, love women without responsibility to provide, want to spend without earning, and respect no one in their world of contrived custom.

A January 2018 study on beer consumer behaviour by non-profit organisation, Global Health Network Uganda, found that many Oyam residents cannot do without sex or alcohol.

Opinion leaders in Ojwii say gambling has become a way of life for the energetic and able youth, while those that try handsets on anything do menial jobs at construction sites to make enough money to buy alcohol, sex and cigarettes.     

Whereas this state of affairs has families troubled, a more ominous development has plunged the community into panic. 

It’s increasingly many deaths, some with clear causes and other shrouded in mystery, which has meant almost every family in Ojwii has lost a member in the past year or two.

Sixty of them died last year alone. For instance, the LC5 councillor of Oyam Council, Mr Anthony Oyuru, died at Pope John’s Hospital Aber in Oyam following a motorcycle accident in March last year.

Last Christmas, Esther Odero died of a heart attack while preparing lunch for her family.

“When I first heard of the sad news, I did not believe it because my wife was very happy and healthy by the time my children and I were going to church that day,” Martin Odero,  the widower, says.

 Also, Geoffrey Atim, whose father Tom Otim, was buried three months ago, died last Saturday.

The deceased, who was diagnosed with a liver problem at Lira Regional Referral Hospital, was discharged from the government health facility on Friday, according to his in-law, Mr Isaac Ongea.

“Despite the fact that his health condition had deteriorated, doctors at the hospital told us to take him back home after giving us some drugs which they said would help to prolong his life,” he says.

Mr Barker Okech, the chairman of Otikori Village, says: “In a span of less than two months last year, we buried seven people in my village alone.”

He identified the deceased as Jakayo Onyuta, Esther Odero, Moses Aloa, Tommy Owich, Mikola Okwer, Tom Otim and Joel Odur.

Mr Denis Okech, the former lay leader at Abella Archdeaconry, says almost every week, a family is losing their loved one.

“There is no single family here which has not lost a loved one in the last five years,” Mr Felix Agoi, a resident, says, adding that many young people are on medication for HIV/Aids.

 Mr Benson Odongo, a resident of Ojwii Trading Centre and the LC2 chairman of Abella Parish, said: “Many people who are living with HIV/Aids often indulge in irresponsible consumption of alcohol and they forget to take their medications, [leading to their early demise]”.

He warns that if the youth do not change their lifestyle, many will be wiped out by sexually transmitted infections.

But elderly people like Mr Aloysius Okello, aka Pepsi Okello, believe that the increasing deaths are caused by evil spirits.

Mr Okello’s son, Alex Alobo, then aged 27, was the first former LRA abductee who died in 2008 after returning from captivity in 2007.

 Alobo, who died after suffering from a swollen thigh, was abducted together with 20 other school-going children when the LRA attacked Akuki Village in 1998.  “We feel that what is killing our people is not ordinary,” Mr Okello, an opinion leader, says.

That superstition has become standard explainer by farmers for failed crops. 

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