Dr. Kiggundu was my lecturer when a 1st year student at Makerere University in 1980. We were having Economics Lectures from the Education Lecture Theater. He used to call petrol gasoline. He was driving a Volkswagen the frog type and he could get his coat behind some students' chair. He was always a confident man who new his stuff. It is unfortunate that he is long gone.
Dr. Kiggundu came to lime light when together with the Late Prof. Kyesimiira that credited Musoga diagnosed the ills of Uganda's economy including inflation. The currency exchange took place when Dr. Kiggundu was the Governor of Bank of Uganda; a reward for his efforts. The mistake Kiggundu made at that time was being party to the currency exchange which say Ugandans pay 30% tax and eventually the savings people had were reduced to nothing yet those with assets were not badly affected. The deal which was wrong on part of Dr Kiggundu was the way he parted with money of shareholders of Greenland investments in buying Grain Milling Company. And the last deal, the involvement of Greenland Bank in the buying of Uganda Commercial bank which according to the law could not be accepted, and summing up his mistakes created his early death.
God grant him eternal peace.
William Kituuka
Greenland sale is fraud - Kiggundu
Former Greenland Bank managing director Sulaiman Kiggundu
2002-11-11
Former Greenland Bank managing director Sulaiman Kiggundu yesterday said the sale of Greenland Towers was fraudulent. The 8-year-old 11-story building on Kampala Road was sold Friday to Hilton Insurance Services at $4m (Sh7.4b). The building was co-owned by Greenland Bank and FIBA, its associated company that owned 75 percent.
“I have never at any one time mortgaged this building to Bank of Uganda as it is claimed, that building has been sold under a mortgage,” Dr. Kiggundu said. He issued a statement from Luzira Prison where he is serving a six-month sentence for defaulting on a Shs 600m loan.
Kiggundu said that though in November 1998 he applied for a Shs 10bn loan security from Bank of Uganda to support “our clearing account” and indicated that he would give their building (Greenland Towers) as security, BOU never gave them the said money but instead took over the bank on Dec. 5. Kiggundu, who is scheduled to finish his sentence Dec. 15, said that his imprisonment was pre-planned to put him out of the way so that this “fraudulent sale of our family silverware” can take place.
“Whereas four Banks were closed, no other Managing Director except me was detained and charged. Whereas TransAfrica bank is said to have lent Sh3b out of its deposit base of Sh 6b, the Managing Director was never arrested and charged as in my case and the Bank has not been closed, instead it has been merged with Orient Bank,” Kiggundu wrote.
Sacked director to sue Uganda's Central Bank
By DAN ELWANA
The former managing director of the closed Greenland Bank, Dr Sulaiman Kiggundu, is considering legal action against the Central Bank of Uganda over his removal from office and the closure of the bank. Dr Kiggundu, who is also a former central bank governor, has blamed Finance Minister Gerald Sendaula and Bank Governor Charles Kikonyogo for the recent statements against him. He said his image and that of the bank had been tarnished by the recent events surrounding the Greenland Bank. "My reputation is the most important asset and not riches which I don't have," the banker told newsmen at his residence in Kampala. Dr Kiggundu claimed that since July, he and the bank's board of directors had sought audience with the finance minister in vain. He said his removal from the post was illegal as the central bank governor had no powers to remove a bank's managing director. All he could do was initiate legal proceedings for such action. He said the central bank was fully responsible for the closure of the bank. President Museveni on Sunday assured the bank's depositors that they would be paid their money in full.
Nobody Can 'Touch' Saleh, Says
Uganda Opposition
By BARBARA AMONG
SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
AS THE director of Public Prosecution, Richard Butera, starts independent investigations of Major General Salim Saleh and Col Kiiza Besigye to obtain grounds over the loss in the purchase of two "junk" helicopters in 1997, the opposition says it doubts the government's will to prosecute officials implicated.
The Uganda Cabinet last week recommended the prosecution of army officers, businessmen and civil servants implicated by a report by High Court judge Justice Julia Ssebutinde in the purchase of the two attack helicopters in 1997 from the Republic of Belarus .
"There has been no will to prosecute the president's younger brother, Salim Saleh. The investigations to be carried out by Butera are a gimmick and are exciting the public for nothing," said Dr James Rwanyarare of Uganda People's Congress. Rwanyarare said that "no one could prosecute" Saleh.
He recalled that the president's brother had been implicated in a number of scandals including the illegal purchase of Uganda Commercial Bank Ltd in 1998, but he has never been prosecuted. In 1998, at the height of the scandal overthe purchase of the bank by a Malaysian firm, Westmont, Saleh admitted his role in helping a local bank, Greenland , to buy shares in the bank, though it was against the sale agreement.
The former managing director of Greenland Bank, Dr Sulaiman Kiggundu, was prosecuted and sent to jail for six months.
However, the prosecutor said that his office has "already taken the first step and a committee with investigators from the CID has been instituted to investigate the recommendations of the Ssebutinde report in order to establish a criminal offence."
Mr Butera said his team have to make the investigations themselves because Justice Julia Ssebutinde's report was not intended to establish grounds for criminal prosecution.
"I do not believe that the government is serious at all. There are so many reports made by Justice Ssebutinde and none of them has ever been acted upon: They have always sat on them," said Elias Lukwago, a legal counsel for the Democratic Party.
Three years ago, Justice Ssebutinde, after investigating the police force, recommended the prosecution of senior police officers, but none were prosecuted after the Inspectorate General of Government, Jotham Tumwesigye carried out independent investigations later.
Mr Tumwesigye told The EastAfrican last week that he did not find enough grounds to prosecute the police officers as recommended by Justice Ssebutinde.
"The government is just gambling on these issues. Ssebutinde cleared some of these people like Col Besigye, so why should his name come up again?" asked Mr Rwanyarare. He said bringing up Besigye's name was part of a witch hunt.
In the 2001, Besigye was runner-up in a presidential election declared by the courts as marred by violence and malpractice. Before deciding to contest for the presidency, Besigye, now in exile, was President Museveni's long time personal physician and the National Political Commissar of the ruling Movement.
Mr Butera said his team would establish their own grounds for prosecution in spite of the Cabinet's directive after reading the Justice Julia Ssebutinde's report into the purchase of the mi-24 attack helicopters.
More than $10million was lost in the deal, which involved the purchase of two choppers from the former Soviet republic of Belarus .
Among the people recommended for trial are Col Dr Kizza Besigye, former Chief of Logistics and Engineering, Salim Saleh, motor rally ace Emmanuel Katto, and his wife Naomi, the owner of Consolidated Sales Corporation and former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Defence, Dr Ben Mbonye.
Others are Uganda Peoples Defence Forces deputy director Joshua Masaba, pilot Col Getahun Kassa, former Bank of Uganda, commercial banking director Cyprian Mwa, former International Credit Bank managing director Patrick Katto and businessman, Kwame Ruyondo.
The Cabinet ordered the Attorney General to lift CSC's corporate veil and proceed personally against Katto, his wife, their overseas colleagues, Max Waterman and Chris Smith and others to recover special damages for the cost of overhaul of the two helicopters.
The aircraft are now standing idle at the main military airport at Entebbe , 32km south of Kampala city. The Cabinet observed that they ought to have been overhauled before being supplied, which was not done.
The Cabinet last week ordered their immediate overhaul so that they could be put to their proper use.
The choppers were bought at the height of an insurgency in north and western Uganda by rebels of Joseph Kony of the Lord's Resistance Army and the Allied Democratic Forces. At the time, Uganda had also committed troops to back up rebels fighting the Kinshasa government.
When the case was first investigated, Saleh accepted that he had received a commission of $800,000 in the deal and his brother, President Museveni, corroborated this by saying his sibling confessed to him and that he had ordered him to use the money in the war in northern Uganda
Mr Lukwago, a long standing critic of the Movement government, said that the Cabinet should have recommended that all those implicated be produced in a civilian court, "since this is corruption and the civilian court has the provision and capacity to handle corruption cases."
In its recommendations, the Cabinet directed that implicated army officers should face an army court martial. The report also recommended that officials should be held directly liable for the loss and be prosecuted for corruption, fraud, negligence and other offences
Mr Lukwago says that the failure by the government to prosecute those implicated in the report showed that the Movement system has lost moral authority to lead the country.
The chopper deal is one of the high-profile corruption cases to have been investigated in Uganda .
Additional report by Vincent Mayanja
EXPOSED UGANDAN BANKING SLIGHT OF HAND RESULTS IN PRESIDENT'S BROTHER'S RESIGNATION
The brother of the President of Uganda resigned as a presidential security advisor (AP Dec. 7) over a controversial sale of a former state bank. Maj. General Salim Saleh bought a majority interest in a Malaysian firm, Westmont Berhad, which had earlier bought a 51% stake in the Uganda Commercial Bank. The Chairman of Uganda Commercial Bank is Mr. E. Suruma and the General Manager is Mr. AMO Oder (Alfred). Saleh said he won't be the first to go to jail and explained that he felt no remorse for trying to buy the bank in secret because he felt it should belong to Ugandans. He has written a book entitled: "What is Corruption?"
Salim Saleh
Caleb Akandwanaho (born 14 January, 1960), better known as Salim Saleh, is the Ugandan Minister of State for Microfinance, and fomerly a high ranking military official of UPDF, the armed forces of Uganda. He is a half-brother of the current President of Uganda, Yoweri Museveni. Salim Saleh has featured in controversies regarding corruption, including being implicated by the UN Security Council for plundering natural resources in Congo (DRC).
Military career
In 1976, aged 16, he left Kako Secondary School in Masaka to join the Front for National Salvation (FRONASA), a Tanzania-based rebel group formed and led by his brother Yoweri Museveni to fight against the regime of Idi Amin. Together with his friend Fred Rwigema and his brother Museveni, he trained in Mozambique with Samora Machel's FRELIMO rebels. It was there that he changed his name to Salim Saleh"Uganda: Our Politicians: Gen. Caleb Akandwanaho", New Vision (published online by AllAfrica), June 5, 2006. In 1978, FRONASA merged with other anti-Amin groups in Tanzania and formed the Uganda National Liberation Army (UNLA), who together with Tanzanian armed forces captured Kampala in April 1979 – sending Idi Amin to exile. Saleh was later made a platoon commander of a UNLA unit in Moroto District.
Following the bitterly contested December 1980 elections, Museveni declared an armed rebellion against the UNLA and the government of Milton Obote. Salim Saleh joined his brother's National Resistance Army (NRA) and the guerilla war known as "the bush war", that would last until 1986. In January 1986, Salim Saleh commanded NRA's assault on Kampala, which eventually led to the demise of Tito Okello's regime, with Museveni becoming president. NRA became the national army, and was renamed Uganda People's Defence Force (UPDF), with Salim Saleh as a commander.
Saleh proceeded to command the army against rebel groups that were remnants of the UNLA, including Uganda People's Democratic Army (UPDA), in northern parts of the country. He was instrumental in working out a peace deal with the UPDA. In 1989, following accusations of corruption, he was sacked from the army by his brother. He later became the senior presidential advisor on defence and security (1996 – 1998), and a commander in the reserve force (1990 – 2001), involved in resettling army veterans of the bush war.
Controversies
While still in the army, Salim Saleh ventured into private business and philanthropy, setting up a string of businesses ranging from real estate to aviation, and becoming one of Uganda's wealthiest businessmen, but also getting involved in several corruption scandals.
Uganda Commercial Bank
In 1998, Salim Saleh resigned from his post as presidential advisor, following allegations that Greenland Investments, a company in which he was a major stakeholder, had used the Malasian company, Westmont, to illegaly purchase shares in Ugandas largest bank, Uganda Commercial Bank (UCB)"The role of the International Community", Human Rights Watch"UPDF Regional Issues", Horn of Africa: The Monthly Review, 11-12/98. His brother, President Museveni, later said he'd sacked Salim Saleh, not for his involvement in the scandal, but for "indiscipline and drunkenness" in the army.
Junk helicopters
In 1998, Salim Saleh's company purchased helicopters for the army, for which he received a commission of $800,000. The helicopters turned out to be junk"Uganda: Museveni's New-Look Cabinet Shows He's in Charge", The East African (published online by AllAfrica), May 30, 2006.
Involvement in Congo (DRC)
Salim Saleh was specifically implicated in a UN Security Council report for being involved in the illegal exploitation of natural resources from Congo (DRC) during the Second Congo War"Final Report of the Panel of Experts on the Illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources and Other Forms of Wealth of the Democratic Republic of the Congo", UN Security Council - S/2002/1146 (excerpts), October 16, 2002. The government of Uganda dismissed the report, and no punitive actions were taken against those involved"Museveni to blame for DR Congo scandal", Daily Monitor, December 25, 2005.
Latest developments
Prior to the 2006 General Elections, Salim Saleh went back to school and obtained an A-level certificate, the minimum requirement to become a member of parliament in Uganda. Following the 2006 general elections, he was appointed Minister of State for Microfinance"Keep out of trouble, Museveni warns Saleh", New Vision, June 9, 2006.
Dr. Sulaiman Kiggundu's Curtain Falls As Tears Roll
Cyprian Musoke
26 June 2008
Opinion
Kampala — William Shakespeare, musing about the ironies of life in his classic, Othello, wrote; "They that stand high have many blasts to shake them, and when they fall, they often dash themselves."
Listening to all the testimonies that were said of Dr. Sulaiman Kiggundu (RIP), it was all too clear that he was a man of high standing. In losing Kiggundu, the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party no doubt lost a formidable link that held the party together.
And yet, like many a speaker at his funeral acknowledged, the manner in which his business empire slid out of his hands bit by bit, seems to lend credence to Shakespeare's observation of the cruelty of life. "It is sad," the FDC president, Kizza Besigye, said, adding "to see that a person who had so much dies a pauper with people asking what has killed him."
Speaking about the legacy of the man who was FDC's first national chairman at his ancestral home in Ntalomwe village, Kibibi Butambala county in Mpigi district on Tuesday, Besigye made the revelation that Kiggundu had declined to hold the office of national chairman, since there was jostling between regions for the post.
It took a lot of cajoling, he added, cognisant of the political clout that Kiggundu wielded, especially in Buganda region, the Muslim and business community that he accepted the post.
It speaks of the man's humility that despite his contribution with his own dwindling financial resources to establish party branches countrywide, he had agreed to serve the party behind the scenes without an office.
The party president also revealed that the party had unanimously agreed to nominate Kiggundu one of their representatives to the East African Legislative Assembly, but again, out of humility, he declined since many people were clamouring for the prestigious but few positions that had been allotted to FDC.
Love for the Kabaka
That Kiggundu was in the good books of the Kabaka, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi II, and that they personally knew and often spoke to each other, is another indicator of what an important link the FDC has lost with Mengo.
A story is told of when the Kabaka, during his private time, used to visit Entebbe Resort Beach , then owned by Kiggundu's Greenland Group, the latter would usurp the work of the waiters and waitresses, and take to serving the Kabaka, kneeling down in the process as a sign of his unwavering loyalty.
So intense was his love for the Kabaka that many commentators compared it to idolising or worshipping the Kabaka, to the amusement of the hotel patrons and attendants.
In losing Kiggundu, the FDC certainly loses that attachment. It is, therefore, a challenge to the FDC leadership, whether they wish to retain that attachment by replacing Kiggundu with an equally loyal Muganda, of whom the party is not short of.
In his address at the burial, Besigye said Kiggundu had drawn clear plans of a Federal system of government that the FDC would adopt after taking power, an indicator of how convinced the late was about Federalism. Kiggundu is survived by six children and two wives.
Links with Salim Saleh
The beginning of the end started on April 1, 1999, when Greenland Bank was closed and its assets attached. Although a very popular man among the Muslims, a clique of Conservative Muslims were annoyed with Kiggundu when he started entering joint ventures with Maj. Gen. Salim Saleh in some of his businesses.
Many of them looked at it as carelessly courting danger. When Jinja Grain Milling was divested, it is said Salim Saleh approached Greenland Bank to form a joint venture to buy the entity. This made Saleh a shareholder in Greenland Investments, which had a string of other business ventures stretching from the banking to the education sector.
It is also said Saleh got Greenland Investments to buy the Uganda Commercial Bank behind the proxy of Westmond. Was the role of Salim Saleh in entering joint ventures with Greenland Investments purely for business or was it political? This still remains a question in many people's minds. In 2002, Kiggundu was sent to Luzira Prison on charges of causing financial loss to Greenland Bank and with his only remaining asset, First Insurance Company.
In 2005, he was elected National Chairman of FDC, which he was till his death on June 21, in South Africa 's Donald and Gordon Hospital .
Greenland struggles
Just after the closure of his bank, Kiggundu, contemplating legal action against the Central Bank, blamed then finance minister Gerald Ssendaula and Bank of Uganda Governor Charles Kikonyogo for statements tarnishing his image and that of the bank.
"My reputation is the most important asset and not riches which I don't have," he told a press conference at his residence in Kampala . He said Greenland board of directors had for sometime sought audience with the finance minister to iron out the differences between them, but had been given a cold shoulder.
He added that his removal from the position of managing director of Greenland was illegal, and that the Central Bank governor had no powers to remove him. All he could do was initiate legal proceedings for such action. He blamed the Central Bank for being responsible for the closure of Greenland Bank, and later selling off all his property.
The writer is a journalist
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