Man cuts off wife’s palm, kills newly born twins

RAKAI. Asuman Ssekidde, a fisherman and casual labourer in Kalangala District has been arrested for hacking his wife and killing their five-day old twins in the process.

The shocking incident happened on Friday afternoon at Bumogolo Village in Byakabanda Sub-County upon Ssekidde’s return from work to join his family for Christmas celebrations. He instead hacked his wife upon realizing the twins belonged to another man.

Regina Namatovu, 35, a mother of four children, survived with deep scalp wounds on different parts of the body though lost her right palm in the process and currently under intensive care at Rakai Hospital. However the twins, who were making a total of six children, passed on mysteriously.

According to Dr Yasin Kiyemba, the Rakai Hospital Medical Superintendent, one of the twins received some cut that caused much bleeding which led to his death and another one died of too much coldness (hypothermia) since her unconscious mother was unable to give her warmth.

Ssekidde decided to go to Kalangala to look for money to take care of his family after realizing that the wife was pregnant, aware of financial implications, and returned for Christmas holiday days after the wife had given birth to twins.

However, when he learnt that he was not the father of the twins, Ssekidde became furious and cut the wife several times using a machete.

Dr Kiyemba said that Namatovu survived only by God’s grace given the nature of her wounds adding that they could not even fixed her palm.

“We are glad she recovered from coma after several hours. Our team worked tirelessly to revive her though she lost her twins,” he said, adding that the twins have delicate life and reached at the hospital late.

He however, expressed fear that blood may have gone to Namatovu’ s brain, saying they are yet to refer her to Mulago National Referral hospital for an CT scan for verification.

“The main hospitals we have in the region lack functioning CT scan and immediately she regains energy we shall send her to Mulago,” he added.

Lameck Kigozi, the Masaka-Regional Police spokesperson, confirmed the incident saying they managed to arrest Ssekidde and is currently under detention at Rakai police station from where he will be produced to court after investigations.

He added that the twin’s bodies were handed over to the family members for burial after the postmortem at Rakai Hospital.

He however appealed to the public to report extra-ordinary family misunderstandings to the Police’s Child and Family Protection Unit for redress than taking the law in their hands.

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