The markets that have been closed includes: Sofia market located at no man's land, Nangwe market located along Nangwe road, Equator market which is at Jinja road and Mawero market locate along Busia-Tororo road.
The trio was arrested on the orders of Busia Resident District Commissioner, Michael Kibwika to help police investigations into the missing funds. According to Kibwika, the suspects failed to give proper accountability on how the money was spent.
John Sande, a resident of Buwembe village in Buyanga Subcounty, said that they are tired of the sorry state of the road. He says that they decided to dig up the road to express their dissatisfaction with the poor service delivery by the leaders.
Emma Eduki Egesa, the LC 3 Chairperson of Buteba Sub-county, says that the roads were misused by Wagagai Gold Company because they dump the soil that they dig from underground tunnels on the roadside.
Moses Obale, the Buteba sub-county LC V councillor, says that he has severally tried to plead with the district engineer to work on the roads in vain because of the deep gold pits on the roadside.
Suleiman Barasa, a resident of Bulumbi village, says that they were digging a spring well and landed on gold cores. He explains that using his experience as an artisanal miner for the last ten years, they crushed the gold core and found two points of gold.
In January this year, Masinya sub-county secured two-2 acres of land in Bunyuhe village for the market expansion to accommodate 1,500 traders.
Councillors passed a resolution to evict all traders who were operating on the streets in Mugasia trading center to reduce congestion and traffic jam, especially during market day on Sundays.
Lawrence Edraku, the officer in-charge-OC Majanji police station, says that they got a report from the army about the arrest of fishermen who were found using illegal fishing gear despite the fact they hadn't yet been brought to the station.
Li Pingfei, the Zhongao-Zhongen site engineer says that they faced a challenge of changing the project site because the initial site allocated to them by Busia district local government had issues of land disputes which prompted them to look for a new site and they delayed to begin the construction because they took some time to developed another new project design.
Suzan Wandera, the Busia town deputy mayor, says that they don’t have alternative parking space to decongest trucks in the streets. They initially had plans to open parking yard in Sofia village but was again given to the ministry of health to construct the modern border laboratory.
Tan Chun Chi, the general manager of the Wagagai gold mining company, says that the investment has reached US $60 million. He explains that they have been lagging behind in the construction due to the lack of the two licenses and expect to double their speed because they expect to begin gold production by July 2023.
Khalid Mugoya, the chairman of fresh food traders in Busia main market, says that his section has a space to accommodate about 500 traders but less than 100 vendors operate there.
According to the traders, they are no longer selling their goods because of the long queue of empty trucks that have blocked their clients from seeing displayed goods in their shops. The truckers also dump garbage and also even excrete in front of their shops, something that poses risk to their lives as they can easily contract diseases.
According to the union, most of the voters who turned up for the elections were reportedly non-members who had illegal boda-boda identity cards. The cards were allegedly issued by George Byansi, one of the contestants for Busia municipality.
In Busia local markets a pair of adults' shoes ranges between 30,000 shillings to 45,000 shilling compared to Kenyan market which is between KES350 (Ugshs: 11025) to KES: 600 (UGX18900).
The D'RDC says that they have registered several complaints from traders and travelers who were conned by the money changers in the process of exchanging Ugandan currency to Kenyan currency.
