Rebels kidnap archbishop in Sierra
Leone
By NCR STAFF
Archbishop Joseph Henry Ganda of Freetown in
Sierra Leone has been taken hostage by rebel forces, according to an Italian
news service report Jan. 14. The story broke just hours after two missionary
priests were freed from the rebels by Nigerian troops.
MISNA, a Rome-based missionary news agency, reported that the
archbishop had been abducted by the rebels Jan. 12 or 13 from his Freetown
residence. Ganda, 66, is a native of Sierra Leone.
Rebel forces have been fighting in the streets of Freetown, Sierra
Leones capital, against government troops backed by a West African
intervention force called ECOMOG, largely made up of Nigerian soldiers. At
press time ECOMOG seemed poised to recapture the city, though the rebels
continued to carry out ambushes.
News accounts said that the rebels were communicating about
Gandas kidnapping with the archbishop of the northern Makeni diocese,
George Biguzzi.
Biguzzi is the head of the bishops conference in Sierra
Leone, a country on Africas northwest coast where Catholics are
approximately 3 percent of a population of 4.5 million.
In a Vatican Radio interview Jan. 12, before word of Gandas
abduction, Biguzzi said he had spoken with rebels about a third kidnapped
priest. That priest, Fr. Mario Guerra, was released temporarily by
the rebels Jan. 12 but then taken back into hiding.
According to the Vatican Radio story, Guerra was permitted to
visit a house in Freetown where he lunched with seven members of the Daughters
of Charity and spoke over a radio with Biguzzi.
Biguzzi said that he believed Ganda was being held in the same
place as Guerra.
Fr. Giuliano Pini, one of the two priests freed Jan. 13, described
conditions in Freetown as apocalyptic. The BBC reported that Pini
spoke of many houses that had been ruined and burnt-out cars that were
littering the citys narrow streets.
Vatican Radio said that Pini and the other priest, Maurizio Boa,
had been used by the rebels as human shields during fighting at the
presidential palace.
News accounts said that hundreds of thousands of people in
Freetown are desperately short of food and water, and most areas are without
power. They say there are many dead bodies in the city and that they must be
buried soon to prevent the spread of contagious diseases. About 200 corpses are
reported to be lying near a hospital in the citys center.
National Catholic Reporter, January 22,
1999
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