Police probe Sheikh Kamoga over unlawful confinement of people at home

Sheikh Muhammad Yunus Kamoga. PHOTO/ FILE

What you need to know:

  • The security raid reportedly followed complaints from relatives of the confined victims after the filed missing people reports at police.

The head of Jumiat Dawa Al Salafiya at Nakasero Mosque, Sheikh Muhammad Yunus Kamoga is being investigated for alleged confinement of 40 people aged between 14 and 28 at his home in Kawempe Division, police have said.

Security operatives from the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI) and Crime Intelligence late last week raided Sheikh Kamoga’s home in Tula zone, Kawempe Division, Kampala and conducted some arrests, raising concern among the public, especially the Muslim community.

The security raid reportedly followed complaints from relatives of the confined victims after the filed missing people reports at police.

Police spokesperson, SCP Fred Enanga said their investigations led the security team to Sheikh Kamoga’s home where several people were found confined unlawfully.

“The investigations started after one Sarah Nabbosa received a phone call from his son, a senior two student at St Lawrence London College, requesting her to plead with his father to withdraw from the alleged Sharia school and take him back to the [ordinary] school. The mother, a 35-year-old businesswoman in Kitunda zone, Ssabagabo Makindye, traced the home of Hajj Kamoga in Tula zone, Kawempe 1, where she found her son. The administrators declined her request to take her son to her former school and she was chased away. Her son had been taken away by his father Twaha Mukiibi, who picked him on May 29, 2023, for school but instead took him for the secretive sharia law teachings,” Mr Enanga said.

Police said when security team went to Sheikh Kamoga's home, they found several other people.

"So, the motive of this training centre that is restricted to male youth and adults inside an enclosed facility which was locked with over six padlocks across all the gates and this was a place which was restricted from neighbours is questionable," he said.
He said the confined people were being fed on one meal a day.

"We are now working with Ministry of Education to establish if this facility is licensed to operate as a school. We are planning to record a statements from Sheikh Kamoga, his administrators and all the parents of the victims to help identify the motive of this secret training," Mr Enanga said before stressing, "We are not targeting Muslim community members in any way. We got complaints from parents that are concerned over the lives of their children and the fact that they were diverted from the main school curriculum."

Sheikh Kamoga told journalists at the weekend that the security raid happened while he was away.
“I have often said, and now, I repeat that we are law-abiding citizens. We have no power and we cannot defy when security wants us. We have been brutalized, but we have remained law-abiding citizens and we shall not change,” Sheikh Kamoga said.