Gulu. Omel Sub County authorities in Gulu district have banned the metal scrap business from their area.
Looking distraught and in pain, Brian seems frail, lost in his thoughts as he stares almost blankly at his mother. He winces in pain and when he begins to speak, you can hear the trauma he is undergoing. It was in a bush and it was heavy. “I told Opici and Abang that this thing kills, referring to the spear-shaped cylinder they had found. “My father told me about it”, he drifts a little in thought as he says this. We wanted to sell it to the scrap dealers in whole but Opici said that we split it before selling. We got a big stone and while Abang held it, Opici hit it again and again. And as he did, Opici insisted that it was already damaged and cannot kill. When it started smoking I got very scared and moved back a little and it exploded shortly after. He says he fled for his life in confusion and can’t remember anything after this. The injured pupils disclosed to their parents from their sickbeds that they were dismantling the explosive and sharing parts for sale to scrap dealers who buy a kilogram of metal scrap at Shillings 600.
Brian Rubangakene (12) and Derrick Okello (12) are the siblings of the deceased Ronald Rubangakene (15) and Morris Opiyo (12). They are lucky to survive such an ordeal with Brian nursing a broken right arm. As his eyes wander around the ward, his gaze appears full of regret. I wonder if he even at the tender age of 12 years is suffering from survivor’s guilt. This is a mental condition where a survivor feels they have done something wrong by surviving a trauma that others did not.
Walter Tootika, Omel Sub County councillor and the deputy speaker Bosco Abonga, said they resolved quickly on Friday to avoid such occurrences since the area is heavily infiltrated by the scrap dealers and explosives left behind during the Lord`s Resistance Army (LRA) insurgency.
The decision, which took effect on Thursday this week, follows the death of two pupils of Bul Kur Primary School and injury of two others while trying to dismantle an explosive for sale to metal scrap dealers. The remains of Ronald Rubangakene, 15 and Morris Opiyo, 12, were buried on Thursday at their ancestral homes in Bul Kur ‘’B’’ Village also in Omel Sub County. Their siblings Derrick Okello, 12, and Brian Rubangakene, 12, are nursing injuries at Gulu Regional Referral Hospital in Gulu City.
Nighty Aneno, 39, who is nursing the injured children at the hospital, said that there are hundreds of mobile scrap dealers who comb Omel Sub County on motorcycles and bicycles in search of scrap metals. She says that hundreds of children comb every corner of the area looking for scrap metals which they sell to the dealers at Shillings 600 per kilogram. Walter Tootika, Omel Sub County councillor and the deputy speaker Bosco Abonga, said they resolved quickly on Friday to avoid such occurrences since the area is heavily infiltrated by the scrap dealers and explosives left behind during the Lord`s Resistance Army (LRA) insurgency.
Tootika adds that anyone found involved in the scrap business risk being arrested or expelled from the sub-county. The area leaders have also started a massive campaign against tampering with suspicious devices so as to avert such calamities.
Yesterday we also discovered another bomb but what we agreed upon is that we have placed a total ban on metal scrap dealers, they are no longer wanted in Omel. This is because the issue of metal scrap dealing that is bringing us problems. So we have placed a total ban, we don`t want anyone to come to trade in metal scrap in Omel.
One of the scrap dealers, who asked not to be named protested the decision, noting that the business should be streamlined instead of being banned. The metal scrap is reportedly transported to Central Uganda where it is recycled to produce items such as saucepans, bicycles, motorcycle spare parts, hand hoes, axes, and pangas among other metal products.
