Business along Obote Avenue and Lira Main Market came to stand still when a FUSO truck registration number UAQ 572W lost control and rammed into a group of people.
The truck which was loaded with cement had a brake failure and knocked a tipper registration number UBG-149D, which was ahead of it before swerving off the road. In the process, four people who were found on the roadside sustained injuries, and several properties were destroyed.
They include motorcycles registration numbers UEC 905B, UFA 521 Q, UDW 567 M and UEW 362, four bicycles, and two vehicles, a Spacio registration number UBG 492C and a tipper Lorry UBG 149 D all of which were found by the roadside.
Those who sustained injuries have been rushed to Lira Regional Referral Hospital for management. The incident evoked fury from street and market vendors who stormed the street forcing the police to fire teargas to disperse them.
Peter Okello, a shopkeeper along the Street and one of the survivors of the accident say that the incident occurred when the truck veered off its lane to dodge the blue tipper
“So, on seeing it, everyone started running. I jumped over the other side of the road. But four of my friends who had not yet crossed over were caught by the vehicle and all of them got hit badly,” he added.
George Rashid Opio, the Lira District Speaker who also witnessed the accident blamed it on narrow roads and double street parking.
Aisha Bint Abdu, the vice-chairperson of Lira Central Division faulted the roadside vendors for crowding the streets despite options to work from gazetted markets.
The area village chairperson Patrick Opio said that vendors have stubbornly declined to leave the streets.
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