AFRICA ( Commonwealth Union) _ An anti-corruption team will be established at State House, with this one’s focus being on bribery in government offices, according to President Museveni’s pledge.
In a Labor Day speech made yesterday afternoon in the rural eastern Ugandan region of Namutumba, Mr. Museveni unveiled his most recent anti-corruption initiatives. I’m letting everyone know that we’re going to get into a big brawl on this Labor Day. If somebody requests a bribe from them or holds up decisions, I’m going to set up a little phone line in my office that investors can call directly, Mr. Museveni added.
Once established, the new unit will join a rather lengthy list of constitutional entities engaged in the fight against corruption, including the Inspectorate of Government (IG), Auditor General, Parliament, Judiciary, and police.
There are already at least two known parallel organizations inside the State House that serve the same function: the State House Anti-Corruption Unit (Shacu), which has unrestricted authority, and the Health Monitoring Unit, which is tasked with monitoring the provision of public health services.
Shacu, which is operated almost like a military operation, has so far been actively involved in looking into pervasive corruption in the nation’s land offices. But it also actively conducts parallel special investigations within the government, among other things. When the President arrived at the soggy location around 11 a.m., he skipped over the customary formalities and immediately turned his attention to corruption, which costs Uganda more than Sh9.1 trillion annually in all of its forms.
However, This yearly loss was made public after a research by the Government Transparency Institute, a global think tank for good governance, was commissioned by the IG in 2022. The research tank discovered that bribes given to tax officers might be held responsible for a sizeable chunk of the losses, which accounted for 44% of government revenue in 2019.
The President repeated a recurring theme of his recent speeches in which he singled out corrupt officials as parasites that have supplanted other issues affecting the nation, such as inadequate infrastructure.
Mr. Museveni has long referred to the Ugandan tax collection agency as a den of crooks. Over the years, corruption has resulted in the termination of several senior employees, including commissioners. The Inspector General of Government is now looking into allegations of big corruption inside URA made by anonymous sources. According to the reports the IGG is looking into, it is thought that the nation has lost hundreds of billions of shillings as a result of complicity in tax fraud and extortion, among other things.
Ms. Amongi noted ethical types of corruption, such as demanding bribes or working irregular hours, and said that it is important to not undervalue the financial penalties associated with unethical behaviour. She reflected on the irony that 70% of Ugandans identify as practising one or another religion.
