news 17 April 2026 Daily Monitor (Uganda)
Tragic House Fire Claims Lives of Two Young Siblings in Kole District
A three-year-old girl and her four-year-old brother died in a house fire in Kole District after their mother left them sleeping with a lit lamp while buying food. Police are probing possible arson amid rising child fire deaths and rural Uganda's severe electricity access challenges. Source: https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/two-children-burn-to-death-in-kole-house-fire-5427486
Police in Uganda’s Kole District, Lango Sub-region, are investigating a devastating house fire that killed two young children on Thursday evening.
Racheal Ajok from Teaboke Cell, Akwirididi Ward, Above Town Council, left her three-year-old daughter Melissa Amule and four-year-old son Innocent Kizza asleep around 8pm to purchase supper ingredients. On her return, she found the house engulfed in flames and raised an alarm, but neighbors arrived too late to save them. The children were burned beyond recognition.
North Kyoga Regional Police Spokesperson SP Jimmy Patrick Okema noted that immediate neighbors were absent during the incident. Preliminary findings point to a lit lamp left in the house, though arson remains a possibility. The remains were released to relatives for burial.
Okema urged residents to switch to solar lights instead of risky kerosene lamps and candles.
This tragedy echoes a pattern of child fatalities in fires this year, including a suspected arson killing a three-year-old in Kagadi District’s Mabaale Town Council on April 14, a man torching a hut in Napak District in February—killing his two children and sister-in-law—and an infant perishing in a Kireka kiosk blaze from an electrical fault.
Uganda’s rural electricity crisis exacerbates such risks. Grid access stands at just 25.3% nationally, dropping to 9.1% in rural areas. In Kole, only 1,335 of 64,375 households have electricity, with 14,861 using solar lamps, per the 2024 census. A ScienceDirect study highlights reliance on kerosene and biomass, citing high connection costs, unreliability, and blackouts as barriers despite policy efforts.
Source: Daily Monitor (Uganda)