MPs want religious 'healers' probed amid HIV surge

KAMPALA - During the grand opening of Pastor Samuel Kakande’s 25,000-capacity Temple Mount Church of All Nations in Mulago, Kampala, in late December last year, President Yoweri Museveni pledged to investigate religious leaders who claim to cure incurable diseases.

“Those stories are there. Now in your case, if you heal, the Government is a quality controller. When there are industrial products, there’s an organ called the Uganda National Bureau of Standards. For healing, there are professional health bodies that must be involved. This means we must get those people, the ones you say were healed; we must check,” Museveni said.

Adding that “If he comes, let’s first get proof that he is sick. Don’t heal him immediately. Let’s take the biochemistry, the blood, and other checks so that we know that he is sick, and then you cure him. Thereafter, we will praise you for the miracle. So, we’re now going to take interest, especially if you get money out of it.”

Picking up where he left off, MPs including Rose Obiga (Terego District Woman, NRM) and Maj. Gen. Henry Matsiko (UPDF) yet again sounded the alarm bell. They say the unmitigated false prophecies could be part of the factors fanning the HIV and AIDs resurgence in Uganda.

This played out on January 14, 2025, during a meeting between the Presidential Affairs Committee, chaired by Alex Bakunda (Isingiro South, NRM) and officials from the Uganda AIDS Commission who were led by acting director general Dr Vincent Bagambe.

The session which was also attended by ethics and integrity state minister Rose Akello Lilly, bordered on Uganda’s Budget Framework Paper for the 2025/26 Financial Year (FY).

While the country has achieved significant progress in reducing new HIV infections, from 97,000 in 2010 to 38,000 in 2023, official reports indicate 730 new cases are recorded weekly.

“You (ministry) talk beautifully but these churches have robbed people clean. How can you sell rice at that rate? Really, since when did we start selling the Holy Spirit, holy what, holy soda? You are here in the middle of the city, nothing. Minister (Akello) you sit with the President, honestly, it is very embarrassing what is taking place nowadays there are prayers the whole night. When do people sleep?” Obigah said.

“This thinking of religious leaders, you hear ‘that there is a lady in white and blue. You were sick with HIV and AIDS, you are healed. Then some women come running. How can you get healed like this? So, facts must be told that it is about treatment,” she added. 

Supplementing, Maj. Gen. Henry Matsiko (UPDF MP) criticized belief in unverified miracles as a substitute for scientifically proven prevention and treatment.

“My thinking is that they are taking us back. I listen, somebody is preaching that I can see you will produce twins this year in the name of Jesus. On radio, TV things which used to be done in shrines, now are done in a modern way and some of these things impact our drives to deal with practical issues,” Maj. Gen. Henry Matsiko supplemented.

Eng. Ronald Balimwezo (Nakawa East, NUP), however, cautioned his colleagues against blaspheming the healing power of the church.

“This should be noted. The healing power of Jesus Christ is a central theme in Christianity reflecting his divine ability to restore physical, emotional and spiritual health. When someone prays for you, that should not be taken just lightly. There is that emotional spiritual healing that you can get. I talk as a Christian, I have seen God’s healing power,” Balimwezo countered.

Nudity in music

The duo added that the complex problem has been made worse by musicians who appear to enjoying free rides and are not governed by the laws of the country. They accused creatives of glamorizing sexual content through indecent exposure and provocative imagery, fueling moral degradation.

“If Jesus was to come now, it is worse than before. I don’t know whether this ministry is aware of nude dancing. People are dancing naked. What are they trying to show? Unless we have something to do about moral fabrics, we are from bad to worse, from the frying pan to fire…Even the musicians, I don’t want to go to anybody’s show. They dance naked and lift their legs. A woman with big things like mine, really how can you lift your leg? The setting apparatus, it’s terrible,” Obigah wondered.

“At times, when I want to compare, I switch on Rwanda TV, I watch their music hour. You see people dressed decently, dancing. You see the culture, society. When I switch and put even UBC, I see people naked, dancing with legs going up. You see a difference. The other day, I nearly put myself in trouble that I am fighting religious leaders, kumbe I was just saying are we using that space to improve on our ethics and morality,” Masiko added.

Funding gap

The push to investigate misleading religious healing claims comes amid a significant funding crisis for the Uganda AIDS Commission. Documents indicate that the entity is facing a shillings 38.2 billion funding gap in the forthcoming 2025/26 financial year.

The aforementioned funds are meant to disseminate critical HIV prevention messages to vulnerable populations across 175 local governments. But, to date, only shillings two billion has been realised. Documents indicate that in the ongoing fiscal year, the commission disseminated HIV prevention messages to over 7,000 youth leaders in and out of school in Kayunga, Luwero, Bombo, Soroti, Jinja, Masaka and Buvuma Island.
In addition, over 25 million people out of a targeted 20 million were reached during HIV and AIDs advocacy events through community engagements and social media.

“Why should we cry that these people don’t have money to end AIDs in this country, but we can allocate shillings 300 billion to ROKO to continue building and for the company to survive? But we don’t want Ugandans to live HIV-free by failing to provide shillings 40 billion,” Benjamin Kamukama (Ruhama East, NRM) ranted.

Communication strategy  

However, during deliberations on Tuesday, MPs, including Dennis Amere Onekalit (Kitgum Municipality, FDC) and Stephen Aseera (Buhaguzi East, Indep) urged the Commission to rethink its communication strategy, emphasizing the need for innovative and tailored messaging targeting the most affected demographics.

“What sort of message goes out to the population? Is it the sort of message like ‘look at me, I look very healthy? Do I look like I have HIV/AIDs the way it is portrayed?’ Or it is the message that discourages people from getting involved. Currently, our young people particularly ladies fear pregnancies more than HIV/AIDs contraction,” Onekalit wondered.

“I think we need to borrow a leaf from those past media messages. You would look at the message and really get scared and you say never to get tempted into doping that. I think we were in primary in the time of Philly Bongoley Lutaaya, Those were shocking messages that would really draw attention to this,” Aseera suggested.

Carrot and stick

In response, Bagambe dismissed claims that the HIV/AIDs prevention drive has faltered under their watch. Arguing that they are in constant touch with religious and cultural leaders.

“We have actually been engaging and last quarter in November, we had a meeting with evangelists and born-again leadership and brought up your concerns to their attention. And indicated that actually, our regulations can bring them to book. But sometimes when you are engaging teams like those, you don’t only use the stick, you also have to use the carrot,” Bagambe explained.

RFO policy

He added that the Religious and Faith Organization (RFO) policy in offing will amicably deal with those overstepping their spiritual boundaries and misinforming the public.

However, while submitting moments later, Nicholas Abola the director of information at the Directorate of Ethics and Integrity, attributed the delay to having the policy to a cocktail of factors including growing opposition and scanty funds.

“This policy has been on our development table for close to five or six years because of the emotive nature of the policy, we have not been able to resolve it. We should have resolved this policy a long time ago, but whenever we are about to, you find people petitioning parliament, cabinet and many other stakeholders that we are trying to infringe on their freedom of worship… So, we need resources to conclude that policy and eventually implement it,” Abola stated.

He added that their work to superintend over ethics in the country has not been made easy by huge budget cuts.

Adding that “Cutting our budget from sh20b to sh10b has done a very big disservice to us. We are almost not able to operate what we should have done. We think and pray that if possible we can reinstate this budget.”

Documents seen by New Vision Online show that the entity is grappling with domestic arrears amounting to sh357million but only sh8million to this end. These officials say has put them on a collision course with service providers.