By Steven Ariong
MOROTO: Karamoja region located in the north eastern Uganda has turned to be a fertile ground where government officials appointed to manage government projects in the region eat resources at their wish.
This website takes you back 10 years ago, where by billions of money sent by central government to improve the lives and welfare of the people in Karamoja ends up in individual pockets.
The first corruption saga was when then Dr Specioza Wandera Kazibwe was the vice president, during her time, billions of shillings were mismanaged under ghost dams which never existed and the implicated officials are free at their liberty.
The second corruption Saga is under NUSAF program right from the 1st, second and 3rd program has not created any change in the lives of the people of Karamoja.
The worse one is NUSAF 3 which saw government giving money to some corrupt Israelites to produce vegetables in the region but now nothing is clearly seen on the ground and money was eaten, culprits are free and no sign that any will be upheld anytime soon.
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Shs39billion was last year approved by parliament for rescuing Karamoja from hunger and this money was channeled to Office of the Prime minister but the Karimojongs continued dying without food.
Some Shs35billion was allocated for disarmament exercise in Karamoja but sources who talked to us on condition of anonymity in the force have told this website that, the security personnel are working under harsh situation sometimes without water and food a clear indication that the money has not reached to the forces on the ground.
Recently office of the Prime minister launched the distribution of goats for the reformed cattle rustlers on the directives from president Museveni but many reformed youths have not seen goats even those who received didn’t take three weeks while keeping the goats before all the goats died due to poor breed.
Now the mother of all scandals is this one of iron sheets saga where the minister for Karamoja affairs Mary Goreti Kitutu deliberately diverted iron sheets which were meant to be distributed to the people of Karamoja.
The minister who’s currently under investigations took the iron sheets to her home and distributed to her political mobilizers and relatives leading to the arrest of her mother, brother and nephew.
These are among the few incidents that we can quote as per now but they’re many cases of fund mismanagement by other officials apart from Kitutu all meant to uplift the plight of the Karimojongs.
These have left Karamoja in the same poverty level despite government pouring money in the region which ends up being kicked like a ball where the goal keeper kicks it to the center of the field and the defender kicks it back to the goal keeper before being shared and partitioned at liberty.
Moses Mudong one of the elders says there’s no government where people have eaten money compared to the current NRM government.
“President Museveni is wasting his time talking about fighting corruption because the people who make reports for him are corrupt,” he says
While John Lemukol another resident says Minister Kitutu will also walk free without being arrested like the rest. Lemukol further says corruption in Uganda can only dealt with when government starts putting those responsible for stealing public resources on firing squad and have them executed publicly.
“What I have learnt with this government, when you steal public money there’s no problem, government will not follow you so much but when you show interest until you contest to become a president is when you will see the roughness of this government”-he said.
This website has also learnt that some of the members of parliament from Karamoja region also are part of the racket of stealing iron sheets. In our developing story coming we shall name some of the Mps from this region who received the iron sheets and kept them in their homes.
Our well placed sources have informed us that after the story of recovery of iron sheets were published, some Mps transferred the iron sheets they received at night to unknown places.
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