Last hours of lawyer killed at his home gate

RIP. Adam Haibala Mulongo. COURTESY PHOTO

What you need to know:

  • The Uganda Law Society, in a statement issued by the president, Mr Francis Gimara, condemned Mr Mulongo’s killing.

Kampala. A lawyer yesterday became the latest statistic in a grotesque cycle of cold murders that have become a permanent feature of life in Kampala and neighbouring districts.

At 4:30am, Adam Haibala Mulongo returned home after an outing with friends, opened his gate, drove in and was hit with an object that sent him headlong down as he reversed the car inside his compound.
Mr Luke Owoyesigire, the Kampala Metropolitan Police deputy spokesperson, confirmed the incident.

“He was hit with a sharp object and collapsed, they left him unconscious and neighbours called police that took him to Kadic Hospital where he died at 10am,” said Mr Owoyesigire. Mr Paul Harera, a friend of the deceased, recounted to this newspaper that he returned home with another friend, Conrad Echodu, who followed him in a separate car with a Kenyan friend whom he stayed with.


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When they approached the gate, something was not right; Mulongo’s car was parked unusually at the open gate with lights on.

Narrative
Mr Echodu, who arrived minutes later, stepped out of his car to assess the situation only to be rudely stopped by an attacker who carried a knife and stone speaking in Luganda, “I don’t want to hurt you, bring your wallet and phone”.
Scared to the bone marrow, Echodu surrendered the items and moved to help his friend who motionlessly lay in a pool of blood.
The three attackers fled the scene and left Mr Echodu and his Kenyan friend helping their house mate.

Mulongo,37, leaves behind a family of two children, one aged three and the other 10. Friends say he was into private business.
Ms Mercy Kainobwisho, the director intellectual property at the Uganda Registration Services Bureau, said of her former classmate: “We started studies at Makerere Law School in 1999 with him, finished in 2003 and did the Law Development Centre post graduate diploma in legal practice in 2004.”

“He was a nice person, calm and loved gym, to be elegant and was incorruptible. It is a dark day for us who knew him and a rude reminder of the need for us as a society to reclaim our conscience. We pray for and stand with the family,” she added.
The Uganda Law Society, in a statement issued by the president, Mr Francis Gimara, condemned Mr Mulongo’s killing.

“ Every injustice diminishes us as a people and nation. We must raise our consciousness to condemn all acts of violence that result in the extra judicial killing of Ugandans.”
Mr Gimara asserted that such crimes are an “assault on the integrity of the state” and they should draw the concern of every major stakeholder. He demanded that government prioritises the security of Ugandans.