THE NRM TOP LEADERSHIP DEVELOPED INTO TRASH MATERIAL BUT THE PEOPLE ARE SIMPLY RESIGNED ABOUT A GOVERNMENT WHICH IS MORE OF A LIABILITY THAN AN ASSET

When you get a sum total of what goes on ground with the NRM Government, you simply pity the people of Uganda. The Uganda National Budget is a ritual otherwise I am yet to know where in the Budget shs 103million was mentioned for vehicles of the Members of Parliament. Instead, for funding the Electric power generation, the Finance Minister proposed cutting the already limping budgets, it is simply a sad and hopeless situation, which only God can get the country out of. When a person can get the backing of the Head of State to loot the country of over 100bn for the loss of City Market tenders, where the beneficiary was reported a defaulter on some payments to Kampala City Council, you simply shake your head over the decay in the whole NRM leadership infrastructure. The way some people in the NRM ranks have looted the country to put up a cross section of investments as majority yawn with poverty is shocking. The NRM leadership is simply a monster which only the good Lord can remove. When investments are seen, some people forget that some of them are the loot, the fruits of patronage, name it. In other instances, NRM leaders have taken advantage of the privatization drive, the have started or even bought state enterprises when they had no capital to run them and instead they have continued to look for funds within the system. It disturbs to see a number of investors not able to show that they own properties and instead people from no where are seen and some baptized (muggagga muto) meaning a young wealthy man, when some looter of tax payer resources has used them to disguise his interests.
NRM is simply a sad story for Uganda as the system is a liability for as long as it continues in the leadership of the country.
William Kituuka Kiwanuka

MUSEVENI CLEARED OF BASAJJA REFUND CLAIMS
By Yasiin Mugerwa
Posted Thursday, February 9 2012 at 00:00
In Summary

PAC committee members resolved that all implicated ministers in the compensation claims be sacked.
Speaker Rebecca Kadaga has received the final report of the Public Accounts Committee on the loss of more than Shs150 billion in compensation claims to city businessmen Hassan Basajjabalaba and Col. (Rtd) John Mugyenyi.
While the details of this report remain confidential under the Rules of Procedure, PAC Chairman Kassiano Wadri yesterday confirmed to Daily Monitor that indeed, he had submitted the report to Ms Kadaga, who promised him space on the Order Paper in order to have the report debated.
However, sources who were part of the drafting of this 60-page report told Daily Monitor yesterday that members “painfully” absolved the President of any wrongdoing for fear that implicated ministers and other public officials might use his culpability as a scapegoat. Under the Constitution, the President enjoys immunity.
“We took note that the President wrote several letters, especially on Basajjabalaba’s Shs142.6 billion, but we had no choice but to ignore all his letters,” a member said. “Our fear was that if we had noted anywhere in the report that the President was the one who instructed these payments these ministers were going to escape.”
Although some members had proposed that the President’s letters on Basajjabalaba be included in the report since he was regarded a principal witness during the inquiry, majority of the NRM MPs on the committee insisted that the President’s name be left out of the report.
Most of the witnesses who have appeared before PAC, including High Court Judge Billy Kainamura and former Finance minister Syda Bbumba, have named the President in the payment of Shs142.6b to businessman Hassan Basajjabalaba and another Shs14.9b to Col. John Mugyenyi.

CIVIL SOCIETY ASK MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT TO REJECT CARS CASH

Parliamentary Buildings
As MPs resumed their sitting yesterday, the issue of each getting Shs103m for cars from government was the talk of the public, with civil society organisations asking the offer be stopped and the money given to teachers. Photo by Isaac Kasamani

By Yasiin Mugerwa & Mercy Nalugo
Posted Wednesday, February 8 2012 at 00:00
As anticipated, the secretive Shs103 million each MP has received to buy luxury vehicles just when other Ugandans are facing serious economic challenges has drawn widespread public condemnation.
Outpourings of disbelief mixed with anger at a House which has been applauded for taking a firm stand against waste in government clouded the re-opening of Parliament as members struggled to defend themselves.
Civil society leaders described the MPs’ gleeful acceptance of the cash as “greed of the highest order”.
“This issue of the vehicles for MPs shows that the 9th Parliament is no different from the rest. It is a shame that they too have turned into vultures,” the Executive Director Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda, Ms Cissy Kagaba, said.
“These MPs should walk the talk about being pro-people. The opposition too shouldn’t be part of the loot. This money should be returned and used to increase teachers’ salaries.”
Yesterday, Daily Monitor broke the story that, so far, 98 MPs had each received the money.
It was left to Kakuuto MP Mathias Kasamba to welcome Speaker Rebecca Kadaga from the House’s two-month recess with a demand for an explanation.


I NEED YOUR MERCY
By Tabu Butagira
Posted Wednesday, February 8 2012 at 00:00

Former Attorney General, Prof. Khiddu Makubuya
In Summary

Opening a Pandora’s box. Ex-Attorney General says prosecuting him over the Basajja pay will open a can of worms over other govt transactions
The former Attorney General, Prof. Khiddu Makubuya, has asked President Museveni to forgive him for any mistakes made in approving businessman Hassan Basajjabalaba’s Shs142 billion claims, but warned prosecuting him would boomerang.
In an eight-page letter, written on January 6, Prof. Makubuya pleads for restraint after the Criminal Investigations
Directorate began investigating him allegedly for insubordination, abuse of office and causing financial loss.
“The principal complainant against me was given as the Attorney General of Uganda, he wrote. “It will be Peter Nyombi testifying against common criminal Khiddu-Makubuya. But more disturbingly, it is the incumbent Attorney General testifying against his immediate predecessor in office. Such action is likely to be celebrated by sections of the public as a “big fish has been caught and, therefore, corruption is being effectively fought”, he stated.
Prof. Makubuya, however, told the President that when push comes to shove, he will, during cross-examination and in self-defence, be forced to reveal “some truths” about the AG’s office -something counter -productive and likely to undermine the office.

Cause for worry
He wrote: “Various truths on a number of things will definitely have to come out. This will be good news for open methods of work and the open society. . And where does it leave certain transactions processed and sealed during my tenure as AG?”
Prof. Makubuya, now the General Duties minister in the Office of the Prime Minister, listed the transformation of Nile Hotel into Serena Hotel; unspecified multi-million dollar loan agreements between Uganda government and international lenders and recommendations of the Committee on Prerogative of Mercy as some of the decisions likely to be “reopened and cross-checked”.