Showing posts with label Uganda. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Uganda. Show all posts
Uganda's And United Nations' Despicable Travesty
>> Tuesday, September 23, 2008
[Black Star News Editorial September 23rd, 2008]
The United Nations is on the verge of embarrassing itself by committing a travesty of incurable proportions; member states may vote for Uganda, whose president's militarism may be responsible for nine million deaths in Africa, and several wars of aggression, to take a seat on the UN Security Council.
The outrage must be denounced and rejected.
The role of the United Nations Security Council is to protect and enforce international law; it is preposterous for a nation-state that wantonly and repeatedly violates these laws to sit on the Security Council.
In 2005, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found Uganda liable for crimes against humanity, war crimes, massive destruction, and looting, as a result of its national army's occupation of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC): please see http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/116/10455.pdf
The United Nations itself as an organization was created to prevent these types of outrages against humanity.
Estimates of deaths in eastern Congo have reached seven million. Uganda was assessed $10 billion after the ICJ found it liable for the Congo crimes; not a single dollar has yet been paid. The Commander-in-Chief of Uganda's army is the president, Lt. General Yoweri K. Museveni. He is in New York this week addressing the General Assembly. It's because he enjoys US protection that he will not be served with an arrest warrant.
The Congo crimes, committed by Uganda troops and allied militias, and detailed in the World court's findings, include mass rapes –using sexual assault as an instrument of terror, which was hitherto unknown in Congo—mass killings, burnings of people alive in their huts, and theft of Congo's mineral and natural resources.
The ICC earlier this year indicted Jean Pierre Bemba, a Congolese warlord who was financed by Uganda, on separate war crimes; Bemba already is at the Hague awaiting trial. Human Rights Watch in a 2003 report, "Ituri: Covered In Blood," identified at least 10 militias it said were Uganda-backed. These insurgent organizations were accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Congo's presidency, according to an article in The Wall Street Journal on June 8, 2006, referred the same allegations of crimes for which the ICJ found Uganda liable, to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for criminal investigation.
According to the Wall Street Journal's report, once the court started its probe, Gen. Museveni contacted then U.N. Secretary General Annan and urged him to derail the ICC investigation. The Journal wrote: "President Museveni of Uganda asked U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to block the Congo investigation, according to one person familiar with the matter. Mr. Annan replied that he had no power to interfere with the court, this person said." [Editor's Emphasis]
Uganda also is tied to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
Whereas there had been relative peace between Hutu and Tutsi since the genocide that accompanied independence in the early 1960s, Uganda upset this delicate balance and re-ignited deep seated ethnic fears by invading Rwanda in October 1990; the warfare ended in genocide four years later after the assassination of Rwanda President Juvenal Habyarimana.
The officers that led the invasion into Rwanda were senior officers in the Ugandan army, including Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame; they were both sent for training in the United States by President Museveni before invading Rwanda. Citizens of Rwanda should contact a smart American lawyer and explore legal options against the United States for collaborating in the invasion that culminated in genocide.
Domestically, within Uganda itself, nearly 2 million ethnic Acholis, more than 90% of the population, have been confined inside death centers, where, according to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO), up to 1,000 civilians were dying per week through governmental neglect, resulting in starvation, dehydration, and deaths through treatable diseases.
Critics have denounced the Uganda government administered centers as "concentration camps" and the 10 to 15 years confinement as "slow motion genocide." Between 600,000 to one million Acholis may have died in these camps during the period of these illegal detentions over the last decade. Please see: http://130.94.183.89/parker/sub01wsu.html
By comparison, the number of civilians killed by the vicious Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels, during its 22 years war with the Uganda government, may not reach 22,000 since there has never been a report of 1,000 civilians being killed by the rebels in any one given year.
Now that the owners of fertile tracts of land in Acholi have been buried in mass graves, the Uganda government has cynically invited foreign investors to seize the land for commercial farming.
To reward General Museveni's regime–after being involved in the deaths of seven million Congolese; one million Rwandese, and possibly another million Ugandans in Acholi—with a seat on the Security Council amounts to the following:
(1) Travesty that exposes the United Nations and the Security Council to global ridicule, scorn, and contempt.
(2) Interfering with the ongoing ICC investigation of alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against the people of DRC by Uganda's army and its allied militias, as already established by the ICJ. The UN would, incongruously, be inviting a suspect –commander in chief Lt. Gen. Museveni—in alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity to sit on the very body, the Security Council, which is empowered to either suspend or to not suspend an indictment by the ICC.
(3) Irreparably tarnishing the reputation of the Security Council; in particular challenging its mandate to end impunity of state and non-state actors.
(4) Squandering the moral stature of the Security Council, without which its authority is compromised and its actions rendered meaningless.
(5) Undermining the Security Council's ability to deal with future crises, including wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
(6) Violating the UN's own charter, which forbids wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, which Uganda already has been established to have committed in DRC by the ICJ.
(7) Promoting future wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity, and genocide, since the Security Council would no longer be able to play any deterrence role, having been compromised by rewarding a country that already was found to have committed these crimes, to sit on the Security Council. Moreover, the UN has also condemned Uganda –as well as the Lord's Resistance Army rebels—for continued use and deployment of child soldiers in contravention of International laws. Please see: http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/index.htm
(8) Emboldening the Ugandan dictatorship to continue human rights abuse domestically and wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, regionally, having nothing to fear from the United Nations and the international community.
(9) Betraying legitimate domestic opposition and resistance to the dictatorship, within Uganda.
(10) Confirming to the world that hypocrisy rules regardless of beautiful phrases such as "the rule of law" and "human rights."
In order for Uganda to be elected, it needs the support of the five countries that hold permanent seats on the Security Council –the United States, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, and China.
The Bush Administration is grateful to Museveni for sending a token military force to Somalia, ostensibly on a peace keeping mission; in reality, to shore up the U.S.-backed Ethiopian occupation.
Ironically, some members of the Uganda armed force now stationed in Somalia may have been involved in the Congo atrocities; the Bush Administration has been willing to disregard genocide in Africa as a result of General Museveni's militarism, in return for short-term gains.
Anyone with a sense of human dignity, or any organization that still takes human rights and the UN Charter seriously and is horrified by this outrageous travesty, should protest in the strongest possible terms to ambassadors from the Five Permanent Member countries on the Security Council.
Send your letter of protest, or an e-mail message, or forward this Black Star News editorial, or call and speak with the respective ambassadors of:
The United States usa@un.int (212) 415-4000 Fax (212) 415-4443 ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad;
China (212) 655-6100 fax (212) 481-2998 ambassador Wang Guangya;
Russia rusun@un.int (212) 861-4900/4901 Fax (212) 628-0252 ambassador Vitaly I. Churkin;
United Kingdom uk@un.int (212) 745-9200 Fax (212) 745-9316 ambassador Sir Emyr Jones Parry;
and, France france@un.int (212) 308-5700 Fax (212) 421-6889 ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sablière.
Also call the United States Department of State as register your outrage to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at (202) 647-2492 Fax (202) 647-0244.
Please copy your letters of protest to Milton@blackstarnews.com or faxes to(866) 242-9689.
To comment or to subscribe to or advertise in New York's leading Pan African weekly investigative newspaper, or to send us a news tip, please call (212) 481-7745 or send a note to Milton@blackstarnews.com
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N. Uganda: Hepatitis E Epidemic Unanswered
>> Tuesday, August 12, 2008
The Hepatitis E epidemic in N. Uganda rages on, as contaminated water sources and poor sanitation provided by government and NGO's for a decade produces conditions ripe for disease outbreaks.
James Abola writes in the Monitor about the government's slow response to the epidemic.
For about two years now there has been no fighting within Acholi between the Uganda Peoples Defence Forces and the Lords Resistance Army.
Reports that Hepatitis E, a viral disease that can lead to liver failure has spread from Kitgum District to other districts in Acholi, killing some 97 people in the process, provides a rude reminder that the absence of war is not necessarily the presence of peace.
The ministry of health announced last week that it was launching a Shs10 billion programme in conjunction with the World Health Organisation (WHO) to counter the outbreak of Hepatitis E. The programme will among other things educate the population, improve water and sanitation conditions in the Internally Displaced People’s camp and help to set up an early warning system so that such high fatalities are avoided in future.
The primary reason why the disease has spread throughout most of Kitgum District where it was first observed in October 2007 and has spilled over to other districts is because of the conditions in the IDP camps.
The IDP camps have been notorious for being a poverty trap and their continued existence will only deepen the widespread poverty in the region.
The settlement patterns within the IDP camps provide the perfect recipe for outbreak of communicable diseases: houses are huddled together, with a very high population concentrated in a very small area . . . Many people in the northern region have been begging that the government and development agencies help them to return to their homes by providing three things, namely: open access roads, build or repair drinking water supply, provide seeds and agricultural implements.
Unfortunately these appeals have so far fallen on deaf ears. The billions from the ministry of health and the WHO would have done a more long lasting good if they were applied to building and rehabilitating water supplies to people return to their homes.
The minister of health said that the programme to counter Hepatitis E outbreak will also set up an early warning system.
That sounds good but will it really work?
From the statement issued by the minister the first case of the disease was observed as far back as October 2007. I visited Kitgum District in January 2008 and was informed by a Non Governmental Organisation as a well as a medical officer at St. Joseph’s Hospital that Hepatitis E had been identified in areas such as Kitgum Matidi.
Is the reason for the slow response by the ministry of health to counter the hepatitis outbreak a result of the absence of an early warning system or is it just another case of poor leadership and incompetent management?
I would love to know if the officer in charge of Health Services in Kitgum did not inform his superiors in Kampala early enough about the outbreak. Not long ago a foreign tourist died after being bitten by a bat and government officials were trampling over each other to be first to respond to that situation.
How is it that it took 97 deaths before there was a response to the Hepatitis E outbreak?
Read the Full Article at the Monitor
Mismanaged Epidemic: Hepatitis E Death Toll Climbs to 97
>> Saturday, August 2, 2008
In March, the Red Cross reported poor latrine coverage (over 100 people sharing 1 latrine in many camps) as the largest contributing factor to the spread of the deadly Hepatitis E epidemic.
The epidemic continues to spiral out of control as the government slowly begins to respond to an outbreak first reported in October of 2007.
The Ugandan government's negligence in the face of dire disease outbreaks like Ebola, have contributed to the ongoing genocide in northern Uganda.
97 Dead as Epidemic Ravages the North
The Monitor (Kampala)/ 1 August 2008 / By Evelyn Lirri / Kampala
The government yesterday announced an emergency plan to fight the Hepatitis E epidemic in northern Uganda after the death toll from the preventable disease rose to 97.
At least 25 people have died in the two weeks since July 17 when the Ministry of Health last issued an update, while the number of infected people rose from 4,829 to 5,779 in the last fortnight.
Health Minister Stephen Mallinga told journalists in Kampala yesterday that the government was launching a Shs10 billion "accelerated emergency response plan" to contain the epidemic in Kitgum, Pader and Gulu districts.
Hepatitis E is an acute viral disease that can cause liver failure. The virus is transmitted to humans through consumption of drinks or food contaminated with faecal matter.
An infected person develops a fever, headache, general body weakness, muscle pains and eventually develops yellow eyes and passes urine of a deep yellow colour. Hepatitis E initially struck Kitgum District in October 2007, but has since spread to Gulu, Pader and Yumbe.
The Health minister revealed that while it is not easy to get infected, the appalling hygiene in the affected districts - where many people displaced by the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency live in squalid conditions in camps - had fuelled the disease's spread.
"You have to take in a substantial amount of faeces -- about one gram-- to be able to get Hepatitis E," Dr Mallinga said. "I don't think anyone intends to eat faeces but because of poor hygiene they end up consuming food with faeces."
He added: "The main thrust of the accelerated response will be to break the transmission chain at individual and household levels where the problem originates."
The emergency response will focus on teaching residents about proper hygiene, improvement of sanitation through construction of boreholes and pit latrines in internally displaced people's camps, and monitoring infected people to ensure they are treated.
Dr Mallinga told a press conference yesterday that the ministry and other partners also plan to strengthen early disease detection and reporting by village health teams and community members.
"The accelerated response will also reinforce case management through provision of medicines and supplies and increase the number of qualified health workers in some health facilities," he said. Gulu District Woman MP Betty Ochan said the epidemic has affected every sub county in the Acholi sub region with women being more prone.
"The Ministry of Health should send film vans to carry out sensitisation because much as we are blaming the local leaders for not doing enough to sensitise the people, the people at the centre have also not done much," she said. "We need these technical people to tell us what interventions they have put in place."
The Ministry of Health has also discouraged the use of clay pots to store drinking water, which they say were found to be harbouring the Hepatitis E virus. Instead, the population is being urged to use chlorine to purify their water before drinking. Twenty-litre jerry cans will also be given to people in the affected districts to store their drinking water.
The acting World Health Organisation representative, Dr Jean Baptiste Tapko, pledged more support to control the outbreak. "We are committed to supporting the government to prevent and control this outbreak. In this regard we are supporting training of village health teams," he said.
Uganda has recently been hit by a string of epidemics including; Ebola, Meningitis, cholera, Bubonic plague in West Nile and yellow fever. A rare strain of cholera ravaged the eastern districts Pallisa, Tororo, Butaleja, Mbale and Manafwa in June, killing 28 people out of 350 who were infected. Read more...
Fact Sheet on Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni
>> Monday, July 21, 2008
What you need to know about President Museveni and Uganda under Museveni's rule
1. Crimes Against Humanity I
The Ugandan government failed to protect northern Ugandans when they needed it most. President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni is responsible for orchestrating genocide in Northern Uganda, where he has incarcerated nearly two million people in concentration camps, euphemistically known as “protected villages.” Read a report by the Govt. of Uganda, WHO, UNICEF and others (pdf version).
At the height of the crisis, (circa 2005), more than 1,000 people per week were dying from preventable diseases in these modern day concentration camps. More people have died from conditions in the camps themselves than at the hands of the LRA (Lord's Resistance Army) or government forces, and over 20,000 children have been abducted.
2. Crimes Against Humanity II
In 2005, Museveni’s government was found guilty by the International Court of Justice for committing grave war crimes in the DRC, including: the invasion and plundering of the natural resources of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and of fomenting ethnic cleansing. Uganda was ordered to pay the DRC $6-$10 billion.
3. Rampant Corruption
Under Museveni, Uganda is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Yet, donor countries including the US, keep donating money to the regime without holding Museveni accountable for corruption.
4. Lawlessness I
President Museveni has no respect for international laws. He came to power using child soldiers and continues to coerce children into joining his armed forces to sustain his regime (See China Keitetsi’s story).
5. Lawlessness II: Locally, President Museveni does not respect the rule of law: he used soldiers to invade the nation’s High Court twice to intimidate judges, has exhibited complete disrespect for human rights, and bribed Ugandan Parliamentarians to amend the constitution to remove presidential term limits. The removal of term limits places Museveni as a de facto life president. Museveni has also been involved in land grabbing without the consent of the owners.
6. Militarism
President Museveni is a militarist who has no interest in dialogue to solve political problems. In 1985 he scuttled the Nairobi Peace Agreement mediated by President Moi of Kenya. Numerous attempts at peaceful negotiation between the LRA and the Government of Uganda were disrupted by Museveni’s actions, namely: 1994 and 2004 peace negotiation mediated by Betty Bigombe, the 1988 negotiation mediated by Acholi elders, and a 2003 initiative mediated by the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative. To date, Museveni has not shown much commitment to the current Juba Peace talks mediated by South Sudan--recently spearheading the creation of the Arusha agreement with the DRC, which stipulates the removal of the LRA from the DRC within 90 days.
7. Rampant Human Rights Violations
Recently, Uganda's ambassador to the UN blocked a report by the UN High Commissioner of Human Rights Louise Arbour, from being tabled in the UN's General Assembly. Arbour has been vocal about human rights violations by the UPDF in the past. The report detailed extensive human rights violations by the Ugandan national army in the Karamoja region of northeastern Uganda. Read the report (pdf version).
In March, demonstrators protesting the sale of a portion of the Mabira rainforest, one of Uganda's largest forests, were fired upon. Three people were killed in what began as a peaceful demonstration. Sign the Save Mabira petition.A Long History Between the United States and Museveni
President Museveni visited President Bush at the White House,
October 30, 2007. Bush thanked him for joining the US
in "fighting terror." (White House Photo)
20 Years Earlier... President Museveni and President Ronald Reagan
at the White House, October 1987. (Source: Wikipedia)
Read more...
Power Flows From the Barrel of a Gun; Don't Point That Mike At Me
>> Monday, June 2, 2008
By Charles Onyango-Obbo / The East African (Nairobi) / 2 June 2008
In the past 10 years, President Yoweri Museveni's government has rolled back a record number of the democratic and civil rights that it had introduced or that had grown of their own in his first dynamic decade between 1986 and 1996.
The government, for example, has pushed through the most extreme "anti-terrorism" law in the region. Though it didn't play a lot in the local media, and was hardly picked up abroad, among other things, the Terrorism Act potentially opened the way for a journalist to be hanged for quoting a news source the government considers to be a "terrorist."
In later years, it has dismantled the presidential term limit, passed laws restricting further the freedom of assembly, and rigged elections like it was going out of fashion.
Two glimmers of enlightenment are the 2005 end of one-party rule and reintroduction of multiparty politics, and the fact that the radical economic reforms that marked the first 12 years of the Museveni government have, remarkably, not been tampered with, although widespread corruption has eaten away a lot of their benefits.
The past five years, however, have been marked by the Kampala government's disregard for the authority of the courts. Thus, when the court granted opposition leader Dr Kizza Besigye bail, the government simply ignored the ruling.
Secondly, it has been unrelenting in its persecution of journalists. Over the past three years, editors and journalists from independent newspapers and magazines have been arrested and slapped with all sorts of charges.
In a fresh anti-media outburst, the government has put together a Cabinet committee to crack down further on an already emasculated press. One of the proposals the committee is mulling is to altogether scrap the "freedom of the press" provision in the constitution.
This action, reprehensible as it might be, is not unique to Uganda. In Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe has systematically frustrated the media. However, as he did that, his government also passed some mildly progressive laws on elections.
IRONICALLY, IT WAS THE CHANGE IN the electoral laws that made it impossible for Mugabe to steal the election outright in the first round from opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the recent polls.
There's also an interesting pattern, that may be a pointer to how an African leader is likely to behave towards the media and the opposition.
Leaders like Museveni, Mugabe, Ethiopia's Meles Zenawi, Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and Gabon's Omar Bongo, came to power through the gun - either as guerrilla leaders or masterminds of coups de tat.
Though there are a few exceptions to the rule, "original" leaders of rebellions and coups are lousy democrats and usually hate the free press. It's possible that this is because, even when they become elected leaders later, they always consider that their legitimacy is derived from the struggle or the risk they took in staging a coup against the day's ruler, and not from the electorate.
Because of that, they feel unaccountable to anybody, and don't like to be challenged.
It takes the death or overthrow of the original rebel or coup leader for this to change. In Mozambique, for example, after the tragic death of Samora Machel, his successor Joachim Chissano was able to talk with the Renamo rebels to end the war that had bled the country dry, and to carry out economic and political reforms.
In Uganda, then, one can expect the wave of illiberal actions by the Museveni regime to continue until he is out of office. Given that he is already campaigning for a sixth term, which will end in 2016, when he will probably stand for a seventh, it could be a long wait.
Charles Onyango-Obbo is Nation Media Group's managing editor for convergence and new products.
http://allafrica.com/stories/printable/200806021304.html Read more...Glimpses of Reality
>> Saturday, October 27, 2007
Video shot in northern Uganda this past summer. Conditions in many of the modern day concentration camps have worsened as heavy flooding has severely impacted residents.
Tour Guide to Corruption in Uganda
‘Corruption increases’
ELIAS BIRYABAREMA
KAMPALA (Monitor Newspaper) September 27, 2007
CORRUPTION in Ugandan has escalated and is stifling the nation's struggle to eradicate poverty, according to a report released yesterday by Transparency International, the Berlin-based global anti corruption body.
The country's ranking in the world Corruption Perception Index, CPI, has taken a fresh, disconcerting plunge, dropping 12 positions within one year. With a CPI of 2.8, Uganda is the 117th most corrupt nation in 2007 in a ranking of 178 countries.
Notably, the sharp decline in accountability appears to mock efforts both of the government and its donors who have devoted ever-increasing amounts of scarce resources purportedly to fight corruption in public offices.
The finance minister, Dr Ezra Suruma announced during his 2007/08 budget speech that the US government had granted Uganda $10.2 million (more than Shs18 billion) to strengthen "investigation, documentation and prosecution of corruption cases."
New Zealand and Denmark occupied the first and second places on the CPI, both scoring 9.4 while Somalia and Myanmar tailed the list as the worst and second worst corrupt nations in the world.
Govt pays ghosts Shs21b per year
YASIIN MUGERWA
Kampala (Monitor) October 18, 2007
PARLIAMENT
DEAD, retired, and sacked civil servants are on average paid Shs1.7 billion a month or approximately Shs20.8 billion a year, according to findings by the Auditor General.
The latest AG's report for the year ended June 30, 2006, indicates that the ghosts on the payroll were maintained and managed by a racket of corrupt but organised government officials.
The report says the payments have been handed out for many years. However, an audit sample of salary payments for July 2005 and March 2006 --for ministries/departments, local governments/ referral hospitals and educational institutions--showed that on average a whopping Shs1.7 billion was paid out to ghosts.
In August 2005, President Museveni directed all accounting officers to clean and remove invalid records (ghosts) from the government payroll. Following this directive, an inter-ministerial task force comprising Ministry of Public Service and the Ministry of Education and Finance conducted a payroll cleaning exercise.
Among the key findings, the AG says, was the existence of invalid records or ghosts on the payroll.
"A total of 9,199 invalid records were deleted from the payroll leading to a saving [loss to government] of Shs1.734, 170,984 in salary costs," the report reads in part.
A computation sample for one month shows that at least over Shs1.7 billion is paid to ghost government workers per month. But MPs are saying this has been going on for long and that attempts to expose culprits have either been too sluggish or pending.
The shocking revelations were made yesterday during a meeting between the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee and officials from the Ministry of Public Service, who manage the government payroll. Budadiri West MP Nandala Mafabi, told Daily Monitor that the Shs20.8 billion could have been used to pay pension arrears for over 1,000 former government employees.
"It's a shame that ghosts are being paid yet we have over 40,000 people struggling to get their pensions. Many of our senior citizens have died without getting their money," Mr Nandala said.
According to MPs, for the five years the ghosts have so far received Shs100 billion. Statistics from the report show that the 26473 invalid records (ghosts) comprised of delayed transfers (65.25%), retired (10.26), absconded (10.03%), died (4.62%), resigned (1.37%), left (0.37%) and others (7.69).
Aswa MP Reagan Okumu accuses officials in the Ministry of Finance and Public Service of 'connivance' to defraud the government. "We are disappointed; How can Shs1.7 billion vanish per month? In fact, officials in Finance and Public service should be investigated. Our people are suffering and these officials are just enjoying themselves," Mr Okumu said.
In the report, the AG found out that of 229,901 records verified, 26,473 were invalid (ghosts), 78 percent of which were from educational institutions, 20 percent from local governments and referral hospitals, and 2 percent from ministries and other government departments.
The committee's vice chairperson, Mr Ssebuliba Mutumba (Kawempe South), said: "This is fraud and this money must be refunded and all officers involved will be arrested." He said this signified the decay in many government institutions.
In her response, Ms Gorret Sendyona, the assistant commissioner in charge of the payroll in the Ministry of Public Service, said the government has embarked on a rigorous cleaning exercise to overcome the problem.
Mr Jimmy Lwamafa, the PS in the Ministry of Public Service, said some unnamed officials have started returning the money.
Officials steal interest on banked govt money
CHARLES MWANGUHYA M
KAMPALA (Monitor) October 15, 2007
A BIZARRE racket in which officials with access to huge deposits of public money hold the cash in special accounts and reap from it in interest can now be exposed.
The officials transfer the cash to fixed deposit accounts for at least a month and end up reaping millions off it in interest.
Mr Ssebuliba Mutumba, the Vice Chairman of the Parliamentary watchdog - the Public Accounts Committee - told Daily Monitor yesterday that the scheme is a "big and complex syndicate" involving mainly the Ministry of Finance which originates most of the funds, Ministry of Defence which is one of the biggest spenders, Bank of Uganda, which does the bulk cash releases and other project-heavy ministries like the Ministry of Health.
"Even if the money stays for two or three days (on fixed deposit accounts), because it is a huge amount, it is still able to make for them millions in interest. It is a complicated syndicate, in fact and the Auditor General only captures just a few," said Mr Mutumba, who is also MP Kawempe South. These government workers with access to the large sums of money, especially those managing project funds, are thus able to make the millions by colluding with top banks in town to hold the money as fixed deposits. The interest that accrues is later pocketed.
The discovery could go a long way in explaining the magic that modestly paid government workers use to be able to live splendid lives, send their children to schools where their monthly salary cannot cover a term's school fees and build plush mansions without the risk of facing court bailiffs over loans.
Top commercial banks in the city are key in the scheme. The money, according to documents available to Daily Monitor, is normally held for anything between one month, three to six months;- during which period it accumulates millions in interest. Now, Parliament watchdog committees are gunning for the heads of those behind the scam and are launching a full investigation. The Local Government Accounts Committee, the Public Accounts Committee and the Parliamentary Committee on Statutory Bodies, State Enterprises and Commissions, are teaming up with the Auditor General to demand that the interest is deposited in the government's coffers.
"We are getting very close to them," Mr Mutumba said. "We shall get their (financial) statements, bank reconciliation and we shall track the money." The interest is usually switched to a separate account to make more money or is pocketed, Daily Monitor has learnt. Meanwhile, the principal sum could either be withdrawn-depending on how much pressure a particular government official could be under to pay off the bonafide beneficiaries or in the absence of such pressure, the fixed deposit period may be renewed.
Because the government does not demand accountability on funds beyond what it disbursed, officials can safely make and keep the difference for themselves.
In one case discovered by the Auditor General, a key government body deposited Shs1.446 billion and at the expiry of the fixed deposit, the project manager wrote to the bank; "the above mentioned fixed deposit matures today 28th June 2001.
We have received your offer to renew the same on 30 days term deposit at an interest rate of 4 per cent and decide to instruct you as follows; 1) Convert Uganda Shillings 867, 500, 000 to US$500, 000 at agreed exchange rate of Uganda Shillings 1,735 and credit that amount into our dollar account. Renew the balance of Uganda Shillings 578, 589, 033 on the fixed deposit account for 30 days at an interest rate of four per cent per annum."
According to audit queries by the Auditor General, in many incidents, only part of the project money is credited to official accounts while larger balances are kept on different accounts which are not official, an indication, officials noted, that some government staff are colluding with either banks or staff members to divert project funds.
Although Daily Monitor's investigations concentrated on bigger project monies, the chairman of the Local Government's Accounts Committee, MP Geoffrey Ekanya, said the problem is bigger.
"It has been going on for the last many years. In fact, it used to be worse under the old system because cheques used to be delayed in Kampala (where they were invested on fixed deposit accounts) and when they are released to the districts, the districts also deposit them on a general account where it of course makes interest," he said, adding that "this interest is never declared."
Mr Ekanya said some affected areas included civil servant's salaries and cited the example of teachers who have often faced the brunt of delayed wage payments. "It is criminal because people who are supposed to be paid suffer and it also leads to creation of domestic arrears," he said.
Sharing the bounty
Because the money is big and has to follow a given trail, which requires many along the ladder to know about it, a well worked-out sharing plan is also in place.
In some projects or ministries, the accruing interest may be given to staff through internal salary loan schemes, Mr Mutumba said, adding: "There is a tendency to lend it internally. It is a very a big game. It is a big, big cancer because at the end of day, projects suffer."
African leaders steal $ 148 billion a year
AGNES ASIIMWE & ANGELO IZAMA
NEW YORK/KAMPALA (Monitor) September 21, 2007
A QUARTER of the gross domestic product of African States - or $148 billion is lost to corruption annually, the United Nations has said.
Most of this money is stolen by African leaders and kept in banks overseas. The UN and the World Bank estimate that the value of criminal businesses is between $1 to 2 trillion.
The revelations were made during a press conference by the UN Secretary general, Mr Ban ki Moon, and the World Bank President, Mr Robert Zoelick in New York on Monday.
To check this practice, the two bodies announced a partnership to recover billions of dollars stolen by corrupt leaders from the developing world and which monies are lying in foreign banks while the countries from which it originated wallow in poverty.
A partner in the recovery effort will be the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.
The launch of Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative (STAR) in New York is a warning shot especially in Africa- where leaders like the late Congolese (Zairean) President Mobutu Sese Seko and Gen Sani Abacha of Nigeria- built obscene fortunes abroad.
However, neither Mr Ban nor Mr Zoelick mentioned the culpability of the banks that accept deposits from corrupt African leaders -and the support given to some of these leaders by powerful western governments.
"The theft of public assets from developing countries is a grave and growing concern, said Mr Ban, adding that stolen assets amounted to US$ 1 trillion every year.
Mr Zoellick on his part said the money being stolen was at the expense of social programmes that would target the poor in society.
"There should be no haven for those who steal from the poor," Mr Zoellick added. STAR is also intended to tighten the noose on illegal money used by criminal groups including international terrorists.
Corruption
The Bank also says officials in developing countries pocket between US$ 20 to 40 billion in bribes- equivalent to almost 40 percent of the money they receive from development partners. The new initiative intends to re-invest recovered money in social programmes.
"Every 100 million recovered could fund full immunisations for 4 million children, provide water connections for some 250,000 households or fund treatment for over 600,000 people with HIV/Aids for a full year," Mr Zoellick said.
The World Bank president was optimistic that assets could be recovered citing cases from three countries - Phillipines, Peru, Nigeria. In 2004, the Phillipines was able to repatriate $624 million of former President Ferdinand Marcos' money held in Swiss Bank accounts.
Marcos, a staunch ally of America, was President from 1965 to 1986, and was reported to have stolen billions of dollars while his wife Imelda lived a lavish lifestyle- filling her house with thousands of pairs of expensive shoes.
Nigeria also recovered $505 million of the Sani Abacha money from Swiss banks but this is just a small slice of the money he is reported to have stolen.
The chairperson of Transparency International Huguette Labelle described the initiative as "a wake up call to those who steal and to those who facilitate or harbour stolen assets" but little pressure has come to bear on western banks and governments who are complicit in the thefts.
In May 2004 for example, Christian Aid, a United Kingdom-based charity organisation, accused the Uganda government of "wrongly" diverting aid money with the knowledge of the British government. Uganda, an aid-dependant country, is also notoriously corrupt.
This year the government has said fighting corruption is a priority but a 2004 report for the World Bank, which gives millions of dollars worth of aid and loans to the country, noted that corruption was key to the survival of the regime in Kampala.
Ugandan Opinions and Perspectives
>> Sunday, October 21, 2007
Why Must Lies Irk Museveni?
The Monitor (Kampala) , OPINION , 31 December 2007
By Raymond Otika
The year 2007 seems to be ending in style as President Yoweri Museveni wages war on "lies." A lie is defined as an untrue statement purposely made to deceive, or to be dishonest with the truth.
In most cultures telling lies has to do with deficiency in personal morality, best articulated in the words of Thomas Jefferson: "He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second time and the third time till at length it becomes a habit. He tells lies without attending to it, the truth without the world believing him."
It was therefore interesting to read Museveni's letter to the Kabaka of Buganda (Daily Monitor, December 22), measured against what he has been telling Ugandans since he assumed state power on January 26, 1986.
The president is annoyed by what he perceives as lies and more lies about his government vis-a-vis land grabbing in Buganda. He thinks the opposition is in cahoot with CBS FM radio and Buganda Kingdom officials at Mengo to pervert the public over the land question; he wants the Kabaka Muwenda Mutebi to step in and prevail over his errant subjects.
The president also took the war on lies to Amuru District (Sunday Monitor December 23) where he lambasted Acholi MPs for telling lies in their constituencies that government intended to grab land in Amuru and give it to Madhvani Group for growing sugarcane.
Going to the problem of lies the president is culpable; he has no moral authority to condemn anybody for telling lies. He has lied to Ugandans a thousand times. For example in 1986 the president told Ugandans and the rest of the world that "the problem of Africa is leaders who stay too long in power."
In his 2001 presidential election manifesto Museveni said that it would be his last term to stand for president. But he became a liar when he stood again for the same post in 2006.
The more Museveni finds himself doing the very vice for which he condemned other African leaders, the more he becomes a liar and loses moral credibility to castigate fellow liars.
As if that is not enough our "dear" president also castigated African leaders who flew private jets to attend United Nations summits while their citizens moved barefoot, not to mention bare buttocks (emphasis mine) for being "pathetic spectacles."
Unfortunately our president also got caught in the African leaders' bourgeois decadence web: he now wants to fly G5 Gulf Stream private presidential jet. Mr president telling lies is not good for everybody. A lie is a double-edge sword; it hurts even its master.
In 2008, let us tell the truth. It is what will honestly bring peace and prosperity to all Ugandans, not lies, deception and corruption.
Happy New Year Mr President and all Ugandans.
November 19, 2007 (Monitor, Kampala)
Finally McKinnon replies to my letter, double standards: Beti Kamya
I made a breakthrough to the Commonwealth Secretariat, when I received a response to my letter to the Secretary General Don McKinnon, published in Daily Monitor of 22 October, 2007.
My letter was challenging his commitment to the Commonwealth principles if he could not acknowledge the FDC petition to him, seeking redress to the human rights abuse in Uganda. The letter signed by Mathew Neuhaus, Director of Political Affairs Division, in a typically evasive manner, assured me that “the Commonwealth welcomes such exchange of views…” (ours was a petition, with specific proposals, not an exchange of views).
He also said that FDC concerns had been raised with the Uganda government in various meetings between President Museveni and Mr McKinnon, blah, blah and that “a number of initiatives are already taking place…. to try and address FDC’s concerns...” in other words, singing to us the lullaby “hush-a-by-baby-on-the-tree-top, when the wind blows..the cradle will fall, go to sleep…Mummy will soon be here…)!
I found Mr Neuhaus’ letter patronising as if the petitioners did not know what we wanted and as if discussions between Mr(s) Mackinnon and Museveni were matters too lofty for us to be a part of.
How do we submit a petition against Mr Museveni and you sit with Mr Museveni to resolve the issues raised, without the petitioner? This confirms what I have always feared; that the Commonwealth is a social club of heads of governments whose primary goal is to look out for each other’s interests as long as such interests do not conflict with the interests of the Western super powers, like Robert Mugabe whose interests are contrary to British interests!
The Commonwealth’s indulgence to human rights abuse in Uganda must not be viewed in isolation. Two weeks ago, USA Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said “we are convinced that in the past two years, the government of Uganda has performed excellently in good governance, fight against corruption……..”
This coming close on the heels of British Foreign Secretary David Miliband’s statement in the House of Commons that “...we continue to monitor the People’s Redemption Army (PRA) trial in which Dr Besigye is a defendant and are pushing for a swift and fair conclusion of the legal process… Britain regularly raises this issue through the local Heads of Mission Partners for Democracy and Good Governance group in Uganda….”
If Britain monitors the PRA case, what have they done about the preposterous Shs2m cost of bail levied on the PRA treason suspects, seven (7) of whom have failed to raise it and are still in jail, three months after court granted them bail?
Fellow citizens, the writing is on the wall; there is a grand conspiracy by the super powers to keep us in perpetual bondage by protecting poor countries’ tyrants. They are quick to pour in Africa aid in billions of dollars, knowing that most of it is squandered to keep the regimes in power through governance systems infested with corruption, patronage and grand electoral malpractices.
We have implored them to tie such aid benchmarks to governance and human rights, but they claim that if they did, it is the poor people who would suffer as if there are no poor people in Zimbabwe, where absolute sanctions have been imposed! The Commonwealth Secretariat’s attitude to Africa’s problems forces us to ask hard questions: What common interests can Britain have with former colonies, many of whom shed blood to extricate themselves from British rule?
How can Britain be the champion of democracy when they bulldozed themselves into Africa, brutally destroyed indigenous systems and civilisations, imposing their own and every former colony had to fight for their independence from Britain? Why is the land distribution programme in Zimbabwe of immense interest to Britain, but not the same current programme in Uganda? Could it be that the people who stand to lose their land in Uganda, unlike in Zimbabwe, are not of British origin?
Aren’t we all really in this Commonwealth thing just to help Britain keep the last vestige of influence over her former empire and the British monarch to have some influence outside the UK? Many will argue in favour of the benefits of Chogm in Uganda, which I do not dispute, but do we need the Commonwealth to build roads, hotels, plant flowers and light our city?
What is the relevance of the Commonwealth to Uganda, since surely, it is not to promote good governance, the rule of law and human dignity, all of which have been seriously violated under the indulgence of the Commonwealth, in the two years leading to Chogm in Uganda?
Beti Olive Kamya
MP, Rubaga North
JOSEPH OCHIENO
In 2001, the UPC petitioned the Commonwealth, praying that the NRM government of President Museveni be suspended from the Club following the sham personal-merit elections in
I was later hosted by Tim Sebastian on BBC television's Hardtalk programme during which we discussed a number of issues in
Last week, I watched with interest as members of the Commonwealth ministerial action group (CMAG), flanked by the Secretary General Mr Don McKinnon, issue ultimatum to Museveni's other brother General Pervez Musharraf of
GIVEN ULTIMATUM: Gen. Musharraf
How I wished I was a member of the Pakistani political opposition! The Group instructed Gen. Musharraf to repeal dictatorial constitutional provisions and restore the rule or law, step down as army general, release prisoners, remove cab on the media, refrain from violence and respect human rights and, move rapidly to create credible and conducive conditions in which free and fair elections can be held and, that the Secretary General was to engage the Pakistani authorities. All this, at the eve of another Commonwealth Summit, this time in
Meanwhile, on the same day, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown was chief guest of the Lord Mayor of the City of
Secondly, he said, governments create economic opportunity for all and, they do not use "threat against innocent people". I was now thinking as usual, about my native
On
Anyhow, that is Gordon Brown, batting for
When the Blairs came in, one of their top priority was to reduce unemployment particularly among the youths using what they called New Deal for Communities. They actually eradicated it, targeting 18-24-year-olds and in the process, created 2.7 million real jobs!
ON MUSHARRAF: Mr McKinnon
Nine years into the new Labour government (2006), unemployment in
As for Gen. Museveni, with 22 years of uninterrupted rule under his belt and, perhaps not to be outdone, he strikes a dream deal. First, kill the coffee industry and give our Bugolobi coffee processing plant to some strange friend, an "investor" in order to create jobs, in the names of AGOA.
The plant was originally intended to employ 1,000 'girls' ( I dislike the word). But that is exactly how State House and New Vision of March 3, 2002 presented it: They must be at least 18 years old, hold an O'level certificate, single, yes, single and must be in good health! As you know, in
Writing in
Yet this, according to Mr Museveni, is the best thing ever to have been done to
President Museveni himself blessed their firing and blamed them for being a bad influence saying they would scare away his coveted investors. All the bosses had to say was to refer the complainst to State House for a settlement.
The girls were the President's children and he alone could determine their fate. He sealed it and they were sent home unceremoniously. What arrogance!Yet the bosses who are in for the rich pickings are no ordinary Ugandans, but strange Asian 'investors'; heavily subsidised by the state, given free properties built by UPC, taxes waived and even staff training paid for by the government!
According to Gen. Museveni,
So having created economic miracles with investor monies in
Our man with grand vision had only the previous day asserted that he will not be "deterred by people who do not see where the future of
Mr Brown will be in town next week. Shall he have time to give Gen. Museveni some friendly advise on how to create real jobs? Shall he apply quiet diplomacy or talk tough about the truth about Luwero terrorism, northern, eastern
Mr Brown, as you told us in
Take a leaf out of these If only our man in
For when it comes to
Joseph Ochieno is UPCs Special Presidential Envoy to the
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