Businessman robbed Shs50m at gunpoint in Arua

A prominent businessman in Arua City was Monday night robbed of Shs50million at gunpoint when robbers attacked him as he drove home, police have said.

According to police, entrepreneur Mohamad Abiriga of Abiriga and Sons Enterprises was further shot in the arm as he tried to fight off the gunmen.   

Police records indicate that Abiriga left his workplace at Rhinocamp Road in Arua City at about 8pm together with two female workmates carrying Shs50million in a bag. Abiriga was headed for his home in Tanganyika Central while driving.

“Before reaching Air Japan Trading Centre, Abiriga dropped one of his workmates and proceeded with another to the same trading centre where he stopped at the shop of his mother to pick her en-route home,” West Nile Sub Region police spokesperson Josephine Angucia explained.

Ms Angucia added: “Immediately after opening the driver's door, two men on a numberless Bajaj motorcycle arrived, opened the co-driver's door and removed the bag containing the money.”

The businessman then struggled to overcome the criminals who shot his arm to overpower him.

By press time, Abiriga had been rushed to Arua Regional Referral Hospital.

Arua police say they have recovered an abandoned motorbike at the crime scene with a case of aggravated robbery opened as investigations into the matter continue.

However, Ms Angucia on Tuesday urged people not to move with “huge amounts of cash on their bodies as this may expose them to the risk of being robbed.”

Past incidents

In 2017, a mobile money operator in Nsambia was shot dead and his money taken in a deadly incident along Pakwach Road in Arua City. The perpetrators have never been arrested.

Three other cases of armed robberies were reported in Barifa Forest and Onduparaka Trading Center in 2017 and 2018 after gunmen trailed a businessmen in an attempt to rob.