As independence arrived in 1962, many in the society were disillusioned with government corruption and economic neglect. Sects and cults began to proliferate across Uganda. In the last year alone the Ugandan government raided an illegal camp at Ntusi in the Sambabule district run by a prophetess who said to eat nothing but honey, disbanded the 1,000 member World Message Last Warning Church in central Luwero and banned the Holy Spirit Movement operating from the southern Sudan. While temporarily solving the cult problem, such high-handed government tactics have driven religious followers into the many rebel movements now proliferating along Uganda's western border. No one doubts that this will cost the Museveni government millions of dollars in increased military expenditure and that it carries the risk of further alienating the local populations.
Many African countries rely on religious organisations to provide basic services.
Education, health and outpatient clinical programmes run by church organisations are supplemented by famine aid to needy areas. Without such aid many Acholi children would have no educational opportunities at all and recruitment to Joseph Koney's Lord's Resistance Army would rise dramatically. It is not just basic services that are provided by the dedicated pastors and priests of the Anglican, Catholic, Lutheran and, increasingly, Muslim institutions. Without Catholic church support the financial outlay for his training programmes would not be possible. Whatever the final answer, one can be sure that some of each will have played a part in the tragic events at Kununga, western Uganda.