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Rev. K.,
New Vision may be slowly waking up to the epidemic of corruption at all levels of the Uganda government that we've been railing against for sometime now.
Fortunately, the international community, too, is waking up to the rot and is beginning to hold the Museveni government accountable for its kleptocracy, e.g. the Japanese and the Global Fund have recently demanded the return of their stolen/misappropriated funds, USA's denial of Jovia a visa to come spend her dirty money here, etc are all encouraging signs.
If only our opposition parties were to similarly wake up and demand similar action of other donors! Those of us in the diaspora in the position to do so, our work is cut up for us: we ought ask Western taxpayers to stop funding African dictators and kleptocrats at every opportunity we get.
Here, too, some taxpayers are aware of our dilemma. I don't want to steal the FDC's thunder, but they made quite an impression recently in Washington DC in this direction, judging from questions from the Bazungu in the audience at their debate with NRM reps -- and the accompanying shrill denials by NRM functionaries to the effect that: "There must be something wrong with your eyesight, our emperor is fully clothed in the finest threads on the planet...
Joseph Kamugisha <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Unbelievable corruption! Tuesday, 13th September, 2005
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![GREAT TASK: Museveni]( "GREAT TASK: Museveni")
GREAT TASK: Museveni
SIR Corruption is one of the rampant evils facing Uganda today. This is manifested in various forms including abuse of office, fraud and embezzlement, falsification of documents, nepotism, over-invoicing, tax evasion, gross misappropriation of public funds, false budgeting and many others. Due to the devastating effects of corruption, people are denied basic social services. Although there are laws and institutions to fight corruption, the laws are marred by poor enforcement and the institutions suffer vast constraints including lack of adequate and skilled human resources, poor remuneration of staff, lack of incentives and lack of logistical support. While it is true that corruption is a worldwide phenomenon, it is worrying the dimension it is taking in Uganda. It is not only institutionalised today, but also threatens to tear the whole economy apart. At the time of the founding of the NRM revolution, many ambi tious people and others who were convinced that the government of the day (Milton Obotes) was persecuting them found sanctuary in the NRM ranks. Many of these people hoped to gain materially after the fall of Kampala. so the war actually corrupted them! After the fall of Kampala, it is on record that the scramble for positions and assets started. With the conviction that these people had fought, greed and use of positions for personal gain flourished. Not only did many of these cadres mismanage public enterprises some looted them thoroughly. By the time of privatisation, public resources had been looted by individual managers who were paying themselves for having liberated the country to the extent that upon sale of the public assets, some enterprises had bigger liabilities than their net worth!
This cancer has reached the extent that those with political connections are the ones who take most of the advertised jobs. The trick at times is that those who are better q ualified for the job are not shortlisted or one fails the interview even before attending it!
The story goes further. The individual merit in elections has made it. It has become near to impossible to contest successfully in elections without logistics. what is surprising is the way public money is openly dished out without conscience to facilitate supporters! it is now normal to promise political supporters jobs without bothering to think of where the money to pay them will come from! These people are free to feast on this manna by virtue of their positions.
However, the worst corruption is related to procurement. That explains the junk helicopters and the under-size military uniforms and the invisible valley dams. Procurement typically accounts for the largest share of public expenditure at all levels of government.
The temptations are enormous and in too many cases, the risks of punishment are relatively small. The growing use of external consultant s is another new opportunity for corruption. President Yoweri Museveni has quite a job at hand!
Willy Kituuka
Kampala
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