According to Okiror, the children picked a black polythene bag containing an explosive from Francis Okaje’s compound, a neighbor to the family of Richard Okwii, the grandfather to the deceased children.
Two children were killed and another critically injured in an explosion in Kanapa Village in Kanapa Sub County in
Kumi district on Wednesday, December 28, 2022. The dead are Dinah Acham, 2, and Josephine Ingolet, 5,
while the injured are Emmanuel Epaja,7 years.
Sam Okiror, the Kanapa village chairperson, says that Acham
died on the spot while Ingolet died on her way to the hospital. According to Okiror, the children picked a black polythene
bag containing an explosive from Francis Okaje’s compound, a neighbor to the
family of Richard Okwii, the grandfather to the deceased children.
He says that all the children belong to Betty Adongo, a daughter of Richard Okwii. “Adongo was married in Bukedea where she had two children (Epaja
and Ingolet) but had some issues with her husband, forcing her to return home. At
home, she remarried and had another child, Acham. But the two elderly children
have been staying with their father until last week when she requested them
to join her for Christmas celebrations”, Okiror said.
He added that where the explosion occurred is a compound
belonging to two veteran soldiers. Both Okwii and Okaje, his neighbor are ex-soldiers working with the UPDF.
Ateso bite
//Cue in “Epone lo inerar…
Cue out…akenton na elayi.”//
The Police and Army have been retrieving explosives in Teso
over time, something attributed to the insurgency in the 1980s and
1990s. In 2020, the Police recovered an active TNT Bomb from the
garden of Aloysius Omasike, a resident of Adodoi village in Mukongoro sub-county in Kumi district.
In 2006, two people were killed and seven others injured in
an anti-aircraft explosion, in Amililmil parish, Amuria district. Over
five bombs were recovered from the same village in 2016 during the UPDF
operations in Amuria district.
Almost all the districts in Teso have had recorded cases of bombs/grenade explosions or recoveries lately. In Soroti, the Police recovered
an active bomb in Moruapesur Primary School Camp.
