Is God allowing the killing of priests in Cameroon for a purpose?
A Kenyan missionary was killed on Wednesday November in Kembong, Manyu division of the South West region of Cameroon.
Father Cosmas Omboto Ondari was reportedly shot infront of the parish but it is not clear who carried out the act following fierce clashes yesterday between security forces and armed separatist fighters.
Sources say he received bullets on the left side of his chest and the lower abdomen while he was standing infront of the parish.
Ordained priest on March 26, 2017, the deceased was serving as the Vicar of the St Martin of Tours Parish in Kembong, a locality situated some few kilometers away from Mamfe, Manyu Division.
Another Catholic Priest Murdered
Fr. Cosmas Omboto Ondari has been shot dead today in Kembong Village by Biya’s Cameroun forces. He was ordained in Kisii, Kenya, on March 26, together with two others by Bishop Joseph Mairura Okemwa and sent to Manyu as a missionary father. pic.twitter.com/CbLnM52h2I— afu nixon ngoh (@ngohnix2004) November 21, 2018
The parish has yet to make a statement on the priest’s demise but this is the latest religious missionary that is caught in the war between Cameroon’s security forces and separatist fighters.
The death of this foreign missionary comes just nine days after American missionary Charles Truman Wesco was laid to rest after he was killed in clashes between security forces and separatist fighters in the North West region of Cameroon.
The church is paying a heavy price in the ongoing war in the North West and South West regions of Cameroon with close to a dozen of religious persons killed.
The US missionary had moved there with his wife and eight children.
Charles Wesco was in a car with his wife, son, another missionary and a driver on their way to a market in the city of Bamenda when he was shot.
He was caught in cross-fire between the security forces and separatist fighters, a government statement said.
The country’s two English-speaking provinces have been hit by more than a year of deadly violence.
The government has blamed the rebels for killing Mr Wesco, saying its troops had killed the four fighters responsible.
Defence Minister Joseph Beti Assomo said the 44-year-old cleric was targeted by rebels planning to attack a nearby university.
But an Anglophone separatist group, which wants to form a breakaway state called Ambazonia, said government soldiers were to blame for the killing.
The Wesco family had spent years raising funds for their move to Cameroon, said Pastor Dave Halyaman of the US-based Believers Baptist Church, which sent the family on the mission.
He told the BBC that Mr Wesco’s wife, Stephanie, had described her husband’s death as a tragedy but she said that she believed God allowed it for a purpose.
He said the church was being assisted by the US State Department in their efforts to bring the Wesco family home to the US “hopefully in a week or less”.
The Kenyan government has however not commented on the matter.