Katakwiâ€"Moroto Road Closed After Clashes

By John Eremu and Nathan Etengu THE Katakwi-Moroto road has been closed to traffic following an incident in which seven Karimojong and two Iteso were lynched by an irate mob in Katakwi town on Friday. The army spokesman, Lt. Col. Phinehas Katirima, said an army battalion was also being mobilised to beef up security in the volatile area where two days of clashes between the Karimojong and the Iteso has left over 20 people dead. A battalion consists of 720 soldiers. Katirima told The New Vision at the weekend that a military gunship had also been deployed in the area as a contingency measure. “We are raising another battalion mainly from the Local Defence Forces and we are also mobilising those already on the ground,” Katirima said. Twelve people were killed on Thursday and over 600 head of cattle stolen when about 200 suspected Pian Karimojong raided an internally displaced people’s camp in Ngariam sub-county in Katakwi. In retaliation on Friday, nine people, seven of them Karimojong and two Iteso who were mistaken to be Karimojong were grabbed from Moroto-bound vehicles and lynched by an irate mob in Katakwi town. Unconfirmed reports yesterday said several Iteso were thereafter rounded up in Moroto town and killed by the Karimojong. Sources at Iriiri told The New Vision the Bokora had also staged a roadblock to capture and lynch any Iteso in revenge for their kinsmen killed in Katakwi. The Katakwi deputy resident district commissioner, Mr. Okello Olanya, said he had communicated to the security to ensure that vehicles destined from either Soroti or Moroto are not cleared. “We have to study the security situation before travellers are allowed to use the highway, otherwise we may end up with more deaths,” Olanya said. The Military Police has subsequently put up a roadblock near Soroti prisons from where motorists are interrogated and those travelling beyond Katakwi are advised to return to Soroti town or seek alternative routes. Olanya said he had advised security organs in Moroto not to allow any Soroti bound vehicle to travel. The closure of the road forced a Gateway bus to cancel trips to Kaabong and Moroto. The State Minister for Health, Capt. Mike Mukula said he had also directed that more drugs be sent to Katakwi and that the three infants injured during the clashes be transferred to the paediatric department in Mulago for specialised care. Parents of a five-day-old baby were killed in the attack. The other injured children to be transferred to Mulago are aged two weeks and three months, Mukula said by telephone from Soroti. Ends