Kiira Region Police are holding three men accused of attempting to torch a sugarcane block under Kakira Sugar Works.
Jamal Kanyesigye, the Kakira Division Police Commander, says the suspects were caught red-handed on Tuesday by a team of police officers attached to the Field Force Unit deployed to patrol the plantation.
He says the suspects who are currently detained at Kakira central police station are part of a gang that was holding fuel Jerrycans and lighting different blocks in the sugar plantation.
He further says the arsonists have spread to the neighboring district of Mayuge where they erased seven blocks of cane plantation belonging to Kakira sugar works.
The Managing Director Kakira Sugar Limited, Mayur Madhivani told journalists that the burnt cane shot from 600 acres to 1000 acres on Tuesday morning.
Early this month, a guard shot dead Batista Atayo, a resident of Nailo village while attempting to burn down a sugar cane plantation.
Angry residents faulted police last week for the delayed arrest of the guard and resorted to burning the plantation to avenge the death of their colleague.
The News Editor ,Reporter at Kagadi Kibaale community Radio
