DRC: Journalist Murdered for Raising Ebola Awareness

A journalist and community worker, Papy Mumbere Mahamba, was brutally murdered in his home in Ituri, a north-eastern province of the Democratic Republic of Congo, after unidentified attackers broke into his home.

 

The army confirmed the killing and said that Mr Mahamba’s wife had also been wounded, before their house was burnt to the ground.

 

He had just finished hosting an Ebola awareness programme on Radio Lwemba, the local radio station where he worked, when he and his wife were attacked.

 

Jacques Kamwina, a colleague of Mr Mahamba’s, told the AFP news agency that he had been stabbed to death.

 

The DR Congo is currently experiencing the second-worst recorded outbreak of the Ebola virus, but those doing the most to combat it are often targets of violence.

 

There is a huge amount if distrust surrounding the disease, fuelled by a belief that the Ebola virus is fictitious, made up by medical professionals to get higher-paid jobs.

 

Medics have been urging people to forgo their traditional burial rituals to ensure the disease is not transmitted, but this has further increased tensions and angered many.

 

Since the DRC declared this outbreak in August 2018, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has said that around 2,000 people have been killed out of a confirmed 3,000 diagnoses.

 

In July of this year the WHO declared the situation in the DRC a “public health emergency of international concern”, hoping that would “bring the international attention that this crisis deserves”.

Blessing Mwangi