Minister Kasolo directs Bugweri district commercial officer on Emyooga defaulters

The State Minister for Microfinance, Haruna Kasolo has directed the Bugweri district commercial officer to name all defaulters of Emyooga funds in the district.

“I am giving you a two weeks ultimatum. I want you to generate me a list of all defaulters. Name of the defaulter, residence, how much they borrowed, and their sacco,” Kasolo said.

“To the borrowers, I have given you one month to repay that money. Whoever borrowed that money must pay back. If you don't, you will be arrested. The money for Emyooga is not for government, it is now yours. However, Emyooga is a revolving fund. So, borrowers must pay back so that the money benefits other people.”

Kasolo made the directive on Wednesday as he continued with monitoring and evaluation the performance of Emyooga program in Busoga region.

The minister said Ugandans ought to take the Emyooga program serious since it will help get them out of poverty.

"You say you want to get out of poverty, but you are mishandling poverty alleviation programs. Someone borrowed shs3 million and has repaid only shs10000 yet the money has to be lent to someone else. You need to check yourselves."

He also urged the Bugweri RDC not to relax but ensure the people embrace the program.

"We cannot keep silent when Bugweri is lagging. We have to double our efforts so that positive change is witnessed in Bugweri. Put in more effort to ensure these people repay this money."

The Bugweri district Woman MP, Racheal Magoola urged government to double the seed capital sent to the district on top of other recommendations.

“Secondly, women make less than a third of Emyooga program beneficiaries. They are very few. The sacco for elected leaders has no female member. That is why I am making this alarm. Women have their group (Bugweri Women Leaders Multipurpose Cooperative). Honourable Minister, I request you to help those women benefit from this program because they were left out of the sacco for elected leaders,”Magoola said.

Magoola said since Bugweri is ranked as the poorest district in Busoga region, there is need for a special development program for the district to improve this state of affairs.

“ We therefore need a special development program for Bugweri. We are a young District, we need special development programs.”

Performance

The Bugweri District commercial officer, Kyampa Lubanga reported to the minister that the district received a total of shs560 million as seed capital from the Microfinance Support Centre and the saccos have saved shs205 million and loaned out shs610 million.

He noted that of the shs610 million, only shs86 million has been recovered.

“The delayed or non -payment for Community Development Officers and commercial officers who are supposed to support supervision to the saccos is a challenge. In the design of the program, there was no planned means to facilitate monitoring and supervision yet the program has a lot of community based engagements,”Lubanga said.

He also noted that the shs30 million seed capital per sacco was a little small for associations with very many members mentioning that some have over 1000 members.

Effects of COVID 19 pandemic lock down just like any other businesses.  Emyooga SACCOS have been equally hit. This has been now used as excuse for most of the groups which are failing to recover the planned loan recoveries. Also some association members used the funds as a fall back source of survival given that some of these businesses were struggling during the pandemic.”

He noted that commercial officers and CDOs need to be facilitated to train, monitor and supervise the program.

“There is need for continuous and vigorous training and monitoring of association members to appreciate and own saccos as a means of sustainable cooperative development.”