A total of 10,500 cows have been offered to Muslim community in Uganda to be slaughtered on Tuesday as Muslims celebrate Eid-al-Adha.
Muslims around the world will celebrate Eid by slaughtering animals to commemorate God’s gift of a ram to substitute for Abraham’s son, distributing the meat amongst family, friends and the poor.
The cows were donated by Diyanet foundation, an Islamic foundation based in Turkey in Conjunction with SENA foundation.
A team from two organizations, headed by Mustafa Erswey, the director Dayinet foundation, Hussein Boldogan , Engine Ertan from Dayinet and AbdulkarimBaguma, the secretary, SENA foundation told New Vision on Monday that they offered 10,500 cows for all Ugandans including non- Muslims to celebrate with them.
Among the cows, 400 were offered to western region.
Cows for Western region were handed over to Sheikh. Eng. Abdul Kasule,the Dayinet representative for western region.
Kasule clarified that all cows will be slaughtered in one place and meat distributed to Muslim heads in their respective districts for better accountability and transparency.
“We used to give live cows and be slaughtered in the respective areas but the system was abused. Some people we entrusted with sacrificial cows sold them and it created a bad image. Our donors decided that we slaughter them and distribute only meat and this will work,” He added.
The slaughter of 400 cows for western region will be graced by the Mbarara district Khadi, Sheilk Ramadhan Kamis Kadidi in morning hours before prayers.
He urged fellow Muslims to share the meat with the poor and other religions as a sign of peace as Allah’s message says.
By Fred Turyakira, The New Vision
