Todate, the public scandal surrounding the dubious circumstances under which the Uganda National Roads Authority awarded a multi-billion shillings contract to a none-existing company to construct the Mukono-Katosi road remains the most visible export to have left Mukono District whose cantankerous internal politics remains a great source of amusement within the tabloid community. However, what we are reading today from the papers about the aforementioned scandal is just a recurring symptom of mixing business with politics that has perverted our society today and in turn grossly undermined the projected returns expected from such huge undertakings across the entire nation and not just Mukono alone. Nowadays for private businesses to succeed in Uganda, the people running them have to be very close to someone in power for them to be able to obtain some form of preferential treatment which has in turn perpetrated the culture of bribe taking within the public sector thus giving rise to the kind of scandals we are reading about today in the papers. I mean, just look back at all the money scandals that have plagued this nation over the past few years alone and youll quickly notice that for each reported incident there was always a highly placed government official who actively lobbied for the adoption of the lousy deal which should never have happened in the first place. Point in case: a) The National ID scandal where government paid over Shillings 240 Billions to a Germany company which was procured under dubious circumstances to print only 401 national identity cards in a country of about 33,000,000 people. The company in question was awarded the tender shortly after the President met Germanys ambassador to Uganda at the State House in the company of the then former State Minister for ICT, Hon. Alintuma Nsambu who had just returned from a fact finding mission at the companys headquarters somewhere in Europe. b) Then the on-going Mukono-Katosi road saga. The crook, Mr. Apollo Senkeeto who presented the none-existing companys documents to UNRA to be awarded the contract for constructing the road in question is reported to be a staunch NRM supporter based in the US. The ghost company in question, Eutwa Construction Co. Inc of Vera Beach Florida presented its falsified records to UNRA through its agent Mr. Apollo Senkeeto and after its documents were contested the Minister for Works and Transport, Hon. Abraham Byandala directed UNRA to sign the contract to Eutwa. After which government released over Shillings 24.79 Billions as advance payments to a company that never existed to embark on the task of constructing the Mukono-Katosi road without any proven financial guarantees in case it failed to do the work. And many more .... So in a nutshell, i think our next chapter in the fight against corruption should be a campaign to push our politicians out from the realm of negotiating business deals in Uganda and leave it to the duly appointed technocrats to handle. Otherwise, Uganda will gradually lose whatever lil economic competitiveness it has in the region if we continue over emphasising the non-tangible value of knowing someone up there in the system over individual merit the way we are doing today.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 21:35:29 +0000
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