Museveni leaves legislators grambling over govt priority

Parliament has reversed its re-allocations in the Financial Year 2024/25 Budget worth Shs750.47 billion.

The money would cater for schools, health centres, among other areas, but President Museveni insisted the money be reverted to initial allocations.

Considering the returned Appropriation Bill, legislators expressed disappointment in what the government considers priorities.

Parliament constituted itself into the committee of supply to make changes to the budget. Presenting to Parliament, the State Minister of Finance, Henry Musasizi, said the call for reinstatement is based on appropriations where money was picked which could influence litigation for the government.

"There are contractual obligations which we must meet for the loans acquired and they might bring about lawsuits being lodged," the minister said.

However, members of parliament questioned the government's understanding of the priorities of the people, asking how the health centers and ambulances could be substituted by investment in Roko Construction Company.

"We have Shs300bn which they are reinstating to Roko Construction Company, which is a private Company," said Kira Municipality MP Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda.

"Remember, this Parliament gave Roko Construction Company Shs270bn, this is a private company. The President is moving money from ambulances, money from regional referral hospitals to create Shs300bn for Roko, a private company.

"In his earlier submission on Roko, he said that Roko was helping them when they were fighting in Luweero, so this is the priority of the government."

“It is a political mistake by the president.and these things will live to haunt us as members. These mistakes must be corrected,” added Napak Woman MP Faith Nakut.

Some told off the Speaker that the appeasement of the powers that be will cost the poor Ugandans, demanding that the Executive stop castigating them for their duties.

“It shows that we are a lazy country that doesn’t want to prioritise major things," said MP Silas Aogon.

"You know that the LC1s are the people who settle our ground down there, because they are the eye of the government, they are the first face of government, that is the first court of incidence.

"That is where everyone runs first, so, this is a matter of priority. Parliament should be given the leeway of budgeting and making sure that they put money to where they think, there are really priorities.

"Why should we continuously extend the term of office of LCIs? We even made it simple that for LCIs, we don’t need to complicate it, let people line up, where is the problem?”

“The appeasement of the powers that be will cost us as parliament and the President should be told to stop castigating parliament for no wrongdoings.” James Kaberuka added.

Members of parliament during their consideration of re-allocations in the budget identified arrears backed by committee reports on unfunded priorities but critical to the public and service delivery.

So, as it stands in the president’s letter, if all the requests are re-instated it means Ugandans will lose out on procurement of 77 emergency ambulances.

The ambulances were already accounted for, complete with their fuel and  maintenance at Shs17billion.

The taxpayer also stands to lose on health centres operationalisation and completion works worth Shs26bn.

In education, grant aiding 66 secondary schools worth Shs16.50bn has been sacrificed while construction of 13 seed schools worth Shs10bn is also affected.

Under agriculture, tractors and implements under Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industries and Fisheries worth Shs50bn will be for another financial year.

But where exactly does the President want the money to be reinstated? Are they party to the needs of Ugandans?

The President says some of the money deducted could cause litigation and so MPs have reversed their earlier direction.

The head of state demanded the money injected into capitalisation of Uganda Development Bank for value addition,tourism and youth-led enterprises to a tune of Shs30bn.

Shs20bn will go into capitalization of Agriculture Credit facility and Shs6.8bn into Namanve thermal power plant.

Atomic Energy Council will be boosted with Shs10bn, and Treasury bonds 300bn.

Former shadow finance minister Muwanga Kivumbi has asked the government to make a commitment whether it will not bring back the reversed re-allocations as unfunded priorities, questioning whether they will not repurpose the budget.

He also put the Executive on spot to tame its insatiable appetite for supplementary requests.

With concerns increasing on the treasury operations which they say is used to facilitate unacceptable expenditures the Speaker Anita Among commissioned an audit on the vote operated by the ministry of finance and the accountant general.

However, the newly-appointed Auditor General Akol Edward Akol awaits approval of the Appointments Committee that is set to sit on Thursday.