When the parliamentary committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (Cosase) opened an investigation into the mismanagement at the Uganda Broadcasting Corporation (UBC), particularly the illegal sale and transfer of the public broadcaster's land, many people familiar with the transaction began to question why Parliament was spending time digging up an issue already decided by court. But SULAIMAN KAKAIRE has found that the critics of the parliamentary investigation might be mistaken.
This ongoing parliamentary probe into the land transaction involving Burahya MP Margaret Muhanga Mugisa, businessman Hassan Basajjabalaba and UBC has been expanded to focus not only on the substance of the transaction (fraud) but on whoever participated in the fraud and walked away scot-free.
Whereas the High court, Court of Appeal and Supreme court have investigated the fraud and set aside the whole transaction, the two courts did not make a finding on the role played by individuals who executed the preordained scheme since this was not an issue before court.
It is under this pretext that Cosase, a committee mandated with monitoring the management and performance of government entities, is conducting the probe based on the auditor general's financial audit report on UBC (UBC) for the year ended June 30, 2015.
According to a brief prepared by the technocrats, to facilitate and guide discussions of members in the investigation, the committee has to establish whether the management of the agency is in line with sound and prudent business management principles and practices.
APPROPRIATE ACTION
"If there exists some instances of mismanagement and fraud; and if so, who are the persons responsible? And to recommend appropriate action to be taken against such officers. Why it was possible for the irregularities raised by the AG's report to occur; and whether there are now prudent and effective systems in place to avert such irregularities in future," the brief seen by The Observer partly reads.
As regards the land scandal, one senior member of the committee, who declined to be named, said their investigation is meant to establish how the transaction originated, who approved it and when, why it could not be detected by some institutions like Uganda Revenue Authority and the land registry.
"We have to investigate and make a finding on all these issues. Thereafter, we shall send a report back to parliament and if it agrees with us, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Inspector General of Government will take over from there to have these individuals prosecuted under the Anti-Corruption Act," the member said.
We understand that three former UBC top managers were charged in the Anti-Corruption court in connection with the land scandal. They include Chris Katuramu, Edward Mugisa Mugasa and Emmanuel Emoru.
Indeed, this is the reason why the committee has invited the respective individuals that were involved in the management of UBC at the time of the scandal.
Following the July 20 letter written by Bugweri MP Abdu Katuntu to Winston Agaba David, the UBC managing director, inviting the management of UBC to attend the committee proceedings, Agaba wrote to Paul Kihika, the former UBC boss, reminding him that; "the proceedings shall dwell on the queries raised by the office of the auditor general for financial year 2013/14 in which you were the acting managing director of Uganda Broadcasting Corporation."
Others invited to attend the proceedings include former managers at UBC; Ruthra Kamukama (Finance and Administration Manager), John Patrick Kateba (accountant), Ephraim Nyangire (acting risk and internal audit manager) and Eliud Atwine (transport officer).
TITLE SURRENDERED
Speaking to The Observer on Saturday, Katuntu said the intention of their investigation is to answer things that court did not or put in effect what court could not.
"If you look at the list of witnesses, some of them were not in court. Even those that went to court were not penalised for their actions because that was not the subject matter before court," he said.
On Saturday, the committee received a copy of the certificate of title for the land under dispute. According to Katuntu: "This title was not in the hands of UBC; but after this investigation, the title has been surrendered. Those are some of the things the investigation has achieved and can achieve."
The committee received the title from Margaret Muhanga's lawyers at around 8pm on Friday. It is not clear, what prompted Muhanga to surrender the title at such a time. When asked, Katuntu said; "She [Muhanga] was responding to the instruction of the committee. Whether there is a hidden agenda, I can't speculate but the committee was interested in the title because court had ordered that the title should be delivered to UBC but this had not been complied with. So, we did work that ideally should have been done by UBC."
Although the title was delivered, it was not clear whether Muhanga would get back the money. In an interview with The Observer, Busiro East MP Medard Lubega Sseggona, a member of Cosase, told us that as far as he knows, no money moved from Muhanga to UBC. "There is no evidence to that effect. If she said to have paid 10bn, then there is need to prove that and if not, it points to the fact that maybe she was a mere conduit," he said.
For his part, Lubaga North MP, Moses Kasibante, another member of the committee, disclosed that by claiming that the money she paid was got from selling goats, it was intended to shield the fact that she did not pay that money. "If she had claimed to have got the money from the bank, it could have been easy to find out, how he got it; from who? and during what time was the money paid?" Kasibante.
But why is it important to know whether Muhanga paid money or not? Sources on the committee have told us that the intention of this is to establish whether she was a proxy or not, and if she was, who then was behind the scheme. "This is part of the reason that the land title has been surrendered to stop the pursuit. There is information that the investigations were leading to some top people in government," said one source.
Well, it may be the wish of the culprits that the committee puts the matter to rest since the title has been surrendered but Katuntu insists that appropriate action will be taken at the end of the investigation. "We have to recover all the land that was illegally transferred from UBC. We shall do this for all government entities," he said.
The Observer understands that the committee has requested for the list of all UBC property that was transferred or sold to private individuals and it intends to put the registrar of title and Uganda Revenue Authority officials on the spot to answer queries regarding some of these transactions. For the registrar, the committee is interested in knowing how two certificates of title could be issued within an interval of three minutes.
According to the brief seen by The Observer, the committee is to investigate a query raised by the auditor general questioning the size of UBC's assets, debts and the corporation's outstanding obligations amounting to Shs 30.8 billion. They include trade creditors (Shs 12bn) and other creditors (Shs18.8bn). According to the AG, all trade creditors (Shs12bn) were not adequately-supported by source documents like invoices, contracts completion certificates and agreements.
The committee is also investigating why 247 staff have no valid contracts and others have expired contracts as far back as 2009.
"Further, a review of the UBC staff and the salary structure revealed that the salaries, terms and conditions of service of the corporation were last set in 2005 at the inception of UBC and have become outdated and inadequate contrary to the UBC Act that mandates the board of directors to determine from time to time the structure of staff levels and terms and conditions of service.
skakaire@observer.ug
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