RUKIGA, UGANDA – A suspected tear gas canister explosion has severely injured the son of a local clergyman at the newly opened All Saints Church Muhanga in Rukiga District.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!The victim has been identified as 17-year-old Dalton Akoragye, son of All Saints Church’s Rev. Jasper Byaruhanga, a family that lives near the Muhanga Police barracks.
Sources indicate the incident occurred at 8:40 PM on Friday, December 26th, 2025, as the victim was closing the church doors when a sudden explosion ripped through the quiet night.
Neighbors who rushed to the scene found Akoragye in serious pain, his left hand shattered and bleeding amid the distinctive smoke of a suspected tear gas canister.
The Kigezi Region Police spokesperson, ASP Elly Maate, confirmed the incident, stating that police in Rukiga were immediately notified and responded swiftly.
Maate added that an Integrated Highway Patrol vehicle was used to rush the critically injured teenager to the hospital for emergency treatment and that a dedicated investigation is underway.
Investigators have recovered fragments of the suspected canister from the church grounds, with preliminary inquiries noting the victim’s residence near the Muhanga Police barracks as a potential point of origin.
“A case file has been opened to investigate the likely cause of the blast and establish how the victim came into possession of such an ordnance. There’s a likelihood [the victim] picked the suspected tear gas canister from there for an unknown reason and kept it,” stated Maate.
ASP Maate’s statement emphasized that active inquiries are ongoing to trace the ordnance’s origin and how it came to be in the young man’s possession.
The incident has sent shockwaves through Muhanga, raising urgent questions about equipment security as residents anxiously await the investigation’s findings.
The condition of the victim, Dalton Akoragye, remains a primary concern for the community as police work to unravel this alarming event.
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