Congo bishop attacked: The Church of England Newspaper, April 16, 2010 p 6.

Bishop Bahati Balibusane of Bukavu

First published in The Church of England Newspaper.

The Bishop of Bukavu narrowly escaped death last week when gunmen invaded his home and threatened to kill him unless he paid a ransom for his life.

According to an email sent by the diocese to overseas mission partners, a gang entered the home of Bishop Bahati Balibusane on the evening of April 8/9. They assaulted a guard, then ransacked the house and tied up the bishop’s family.

Held at gunpoint, the bishop was told by the gunmen they had been paid £15,000 to kill him. The bishop pled for his life and the gunmen said they would spare him if he paid a ransom. The bishop gave the bandits the money he had, and his attackers withdrew, taking their booty with them.

The amount of the ransom is unknown, and attempts to corroborate the story with the bishop have so far been unsuccessful.

Over a 5.4 million people have died in the eastern Congo since 1998, the International Rescue Committee reports, as rival militias and Congolese troops fight for control of the region. Tribal jealousies, battles for control of the region’s mineral wealth, and unresolved disputes from the 1994 Rwandan genocide have fueled the fighting.

In a 2008 statement released through the Congo Church Association, Bishop Bahati warned that “over one million people” have been displaced by the fighting. “Men, women, children are living outside, in schools, in Churches and in some hospitable families. They don’t have water, food, materials, clothes, utensils and latrines. These people living in hardship are exposed to hunger, illness and death of some fathers, mothers and children,” he wrote in a call for “urgent spiritual, material and financial support.”

Church aid agencies report the fighting between Congolese troops and the rebels has led to widespread atrocities. The Barnabas Fund stated “ young men [have been] killed, women raped by retreating government troops, children kidnapped and forcibly recruited as child soldiers to fight a war that is not their own, soldiers and militias [are] pillaging and looting, and hundreds of thousands of displaced people [are] fleeing for their lives.”

Aid agencies report the situation has stabilized over the last two years, but the Congo remains a lawless and unstable region. In a bid to call the world’s attention to the fighting in the Congo, the World Council of Churches will bring together “high-level representatives of government, churches and international organisations” in Kinshasa this week.

“There has been limited improvement in the situation of human rights in the Democratic Republic of Congo, over the last couple of years,” the WCC’s Christina Papazoglou said.

The April 14-17 meeting hopes to “provide a space where national and international stakeholders can discuss the major challenges the country is facing and the role the Churches can play in order to enhance the promotion and protection of human rights,” she said.