Arua, (UG): Residents of Arua City in West Nile witnessed gunfire on Tuesday evening after a woman was killed and two others injured as officers from the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) got involved in an accident while chasing a suspected errant motorcyclist.
Preliminary information indicates that the three people who were moving on the motorcycle were family members heading home from Arua Town.
According to eyewitnesses who spoke local daily; Monitor, the ugly incident registered near Rhema Hospital ensued when the UR enforcers crossed and stopped abruptly in front of the motorcyclist who rammed into their car while carrying three people, including the deceased.
“The URA enforcers wanted to escape from the accident scene. So, I had to follow and make sure that they transport the injured and the dead to the hospital,” former Ayivu county Member of Parliament (MP) Bernard Atiku narrated to the publication.
By Tuesday evening, the angry residents had stormed areas around Arua Regional Referral Hospital where the accident victims were rushed to by the URA enforcers who they aimed to lynch with stones.
To retaliate and see off the locals, eyewitnesses say the URA enforcers in the area fired several live bullets in the air to disperse the crowd in order to aid their escape from the hospital.
By Tuesday evening, the body of the yet-to-be-identified woman was still at the hospital pending postmortem while the motorcyclist, who broke his leg, and the other victim who sustained head injuries, were receiving treatment at the same health facility.
The incident comes just three after URA enforcers allegedly killed a suspected smuggler who crossed into neighbouring DR Congo via Koboko District.
The deceased in the Kobok incident was identified as 22-year-old Jackson Amori, a resident of Ponura Parish, Lobule Sub-County in the West Nile district.
The Police in the area were yet to issue a statement on the incident, neither had the tax collecting body nor the security agencies in the country.
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