Uganda’s President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni on July 08 opened the Public Service Leaders’ Introspection Retreat for Ministers, Permanent Secretaries and Members of the NRM top leadership at the National Leadership Institute, Kyankwanzi, with an explanation on the dimensions of corruption and a vow to crush the vice.
Discussions on the anti-corruption fight are expected to take dominate some sessions in the seven-day retreat being held under the theme ‘Answering the Citizens’ Call: Improved Service Delivery for Social Economic Transformation.’
As he opened the retreat, the president reiterated his position to fight corruption at all levels of government, making it clear once again that public servants engaged in corruption will face it rough, whether they are at the village level, in the ministries or in institutions like Parliament of Uganda.
MUSEVENI ON TWO DIMENSIONS OF CORRUPTION
He explained the two dimensions of corruption: theft of funds and bribery for jobs. He recalled a parent who recently told him his children could not find jobs at the local government level because some officials at the District Service Commission were demanding a Shs10m bribe for jobs.
“The corruption we are facing now has two dimensions. One dimension is the stealing of government money, taking bribes from the public to provide government services, and missing the procurement processes to cheat the State, among others,” explained the president.
“This selling of government jobs is becoming very serious. In the local governments, and maybe in other areas. The other day I had a delegation from Bunyoro. They were from the districts of Kagadi, Kakumiro and Kibalae. One of the speakers said that my children are educated but they can’t get jobs and I don’t have Shs10 million to buy a job in the local government.”
MUSEVENI PROUD OF THE ARMY’S RECORD
On corruption in the UPDF, the national army, Museveni saluted the men and women in uniform for largely shunning corruption. He noted that while there were still some bad apples in the national army, these would be weeded out.
“One of our [NRM party] mobilizers composed a verse in a song that said soldiers are like nuns. They are soldiers but they behave politely and are like nuns. A large part of that heritage has been kept. The Amin-Obote roadblocks by the army where the wananchi would be robbed and brutalized disappeared forever. You can never see roadblocks in the army again,” said Museveni.
“Some corruption by a few elements in charge of money, supplies, and deployment has manifested itself. However, the patriots in the UPDF are handling this. The bulk of the UPDF are not involved and are in fact victims of these corrupt people.”
But as he said this about the fight against corruption, his opponent Dr Kizza Besigye was telling Ugandans how Museveni has been defending corrupt people since his bush war days. (See Details Here).
Previously, there have been allegations that some officials in the Presidency sold each RDC job at Shs20m, with those who failed to pay being deleted from the list. The Presidency dismissed the allegations. (Read More Here, There and Over There).
Similar allegations came up previously doing the recruitment of teachers. It was alleged that each teaching job went for as low as Shs2m, but the Education Service Commission dismissed this claim. (See Details Here).
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