HOW DOES A PROFESSIONAL GOVT. CREDIT MP ACCOUNTS WITH OFFICIAL MONEY

Sincerely, NRM Government should stop taking Ugandans for fools! How on earth do you credit official money on individual current accounts? Let us stop accepting being fooled. This is robbery. A customer only to check his account and find a credit of shs 20m; it is absurd. THE Architects of these shameful moves should stop imagining that we are all fools. Much as Uganda is still dominated by illiterates, and those who least understand how Government business
is done, some of us cannot be taken for a ride. Uganda has so many professionals who can supervise NAADS, but how do you give hungry hyena's a free catch like that when they are looking for votes? We have MPs who have to pay back this money to the consolidated fund. Assuming such MPs have out standing obligations with their banks what happens next. Isn't the bank at liberty to recover its money? Can they be able to pay back the shs 20m? For the NRM MPs who are playing in the devils hands, and are receiving the money with open hands, how will they deal with accountability if banks reduce this money given their indebtedness? Why is the NRM Government doing shameful things unconcerned? What picture does a Government by literate people give the international community when it gives such money and its credited on personal accounts?
To the Executive in Uganda, the reading is very clear, we deserve better.
William Kituuka Kiwanuka

OPPOSITION MPs REJECT SHS 20M 'BRIBE'
By Yasiin Mugerwa & Mercy Nalugo (email the author)

Posted Thursday, January 20 2011 at 00:00
A handful of MPs yesterday rejected Shs20 million worth of taxpayers’ money wired to their personal bank accounts by the government two months to the end of their tenure in the 8th Parliament.
The money, coming 28 days to the elections, has been described as a “bribe” by opposition lawmakers, who vowed to return it to the Consolidated Fund. Others led by House Public Accounts Committee Chairman Nandala Mafabi said they would use it as evidence to sue the government.
“This is blood money, it’s a scandal of the year” Mr Mafabi said. “This is part of the Shs602 billion NRM MPs passed in the supplementary budget. They want to use Shs1.2 billion for 60 opposition MPs and bribe NRM MPs with Shs5.3 billion. We are taking the government to court since we now have evidence to pin President Museveni on bribery.”
“These people are shameless. They think they can trick us. The role of MPs is not to monitor government programmes; it’s entirely oversight. How many hospitals are these? How many drugs can be bought using Shs6.5 billion? How about the 320 women and children who die of malaria everyday? ”
The government on January 15 wired Shs6.5 billion to 326 MPs. According to payment vouchers Daily Monitor saw, the money was paid to “monitor government programmes.”
Finance Minister Syda Bbumba yesterday said it was given in “good faith”. “We paid this money to MPs across the board purposely to do their work and there is nothing unique or stealthy about this money.”
A day after the ruling party forced through a controversial supplementary budget of Shs602 billion, it emerged on January 5 that all NRM parliamentary flag bearers were to pocket Shs20million each. The 238 directly-elected aspirants shared Shs4.7b while the 112 district Women aspirants got Shs2.8b.
Lwemiyaga MP Theodore Ssekikubo (NRM) who in 2004 exposed the Shs5m “bribe” given to MPs during the scrapping of presidential term limits said: “The timing of the Shs20m is suspicious. They can take their money. In any case, there is no time to do the monitoring.”
Kawempe South MP Ssebuliba Mutumba (DP), who also vowed to return the money, said he asked authorities in Parliament to explain why the money was in his account. “This country is bleeding. This is a bribe. It’s unfair to taxpayers. They want to compromise us and acquit Chogm thieves in government. This is madness and a black day in the history of our country,” Mr Ssebuliba said.
Kitgum Woman MP Beatrice Anywar and others from the opposition yesterday accused the government of blackmail. “How do I account for [the money]? This is bribery which should be condemned in the strongest terms,” she said.
Ms Anywar asked MPs to return the money and appealed to the electorate to vote out MPs who will take the money. This money constitutes about 5 per cent of this year’s Naads programme budget of Shs130b. Naads Executive Director Silim Nahdy, yesterday said: “I don’t know about any plan for MPs to monitor Naads.”