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This weekend sections of online media produced a screaming story which showed that the ICT & national guidance ministry permanent secretary Professor Aminah Zawedde had single-handedly decided to purchase one Toyota Land Cruiser VX for herself to do ministry work at Ugx965m-on August 31 2022.
The online story also falsely showed that the permanent secretary had disregarded government procedures governing purchase of vehicles.
The bitter truth of the matter is that the two vehicles were bought from Cadam enterprises Ltd which is based in Naguru at a total of Ugx950m which came to Ugx1.2bn when VAT and other taxes are included.
The two vehicles were for Ministers at ICT viz-one for Chris Baryomunsi and another for state minister Godfrey Kabyanga. So, all this shows that Ugx950m was for two vehicles and not one.
When Baryomunsi rejected the vehicle saying much as it was new and model 2022, it was smaller than expected. It was small because Toyota’s newer models are smaller than their predecessors, made years earlier.
So the one for Baryomunsi was allocated to the office of permanent secretary to facilitate ICT development related activities. But the process had started at the beginning of 2021, long before Professor Zawedde became permanent secretary at ICT & national guidance ministry.
As early as February 2021, former PS Vincent Bagiire and then minister Judith Nabakooba were already writing letters to UCC and other government ministries and entities to facilitate the buying of the two vehicles.
In February 2021, Bagiire wrote to UCC asking the executive director to use the non-tax revenue monies to facilitate the purchase of two brand new vehicles for ministers at ICT.
This news investigator has seen letters of Nabakooba to public service minister Muruuli Mukasa asking him for permission to allow the purchase of two vehicles for her ministry. Muruuli Mukasa replied quickly and authorized the ministry of ICT & national guidance to buy the two cars.
This procedure of writing to Mukasa explaining everything has to be followed because the President put in place a directive many years ago directing all ministries to reduce purchase of vehicles which can only be purchased after getting written permission of Muruuli Mukasa and the ministry of public service.
Upon perusing through the available documents, it has emerged that the process to buy the two vehicles started long before Professor Zawedde became permanent secretary at ICT. She only happened to be in office as of August 2022 when UCC finally managed to get the money. All the letters she wrote were just follow ups to what had started long before she became the permanent secretary at the ministry.
Being bankers for Cadam enterprises Ltd, Centenary Bank was involved in securing the payment guarantees on behalf of the supplier to prove that all would be well.
This news blog has seen correspondences from a number of Centenary Bank managers all of which indicating that their client had been contracted to and indeed delivered two Toyota Land Cruiser VXs at a cost of 362,450 dollars of which 70% or 253,715 dollars came in late 2022 as first installment or payment from UCC; acting or paying on behalf of the ministry of ICT & national guidance.
The letters written by Joseph Lutwama, Twesigye Wycliffe, Paul Lubega, Angela Amuge-all managers at Centernary Bank-indicate that the Ugx950m was being paid for the purchase of two ministry vehicles and not one.
The payments guarantee the Bank executed on behalf of Cedam enterprises Ltd to facilitate the supply and delivery of the two vehicles was valid for one year and was valid up to July 28th 2023.
Mellan Mugaya, the authorised signatory and the finance & administration manager at Cadam enterprises Ltd also confirmed in writing that the Ugx950m they were being paid through their Centenary Bank Lugogo branch was for the supply and delivery of two brand new model 2022 Land Cruiser VX cars, and not one as the online news reported.
And all this procurement was authorized and authenticated as legit by both the PPDA and the solicitor general through their written authorization and no objection dated June 13 2022.
On that date, F Nyamwenge wrote on behalf of the solicitor general clearly showing the contract between Cadam enterprises Ltd and the ministry of ICT & national guidance was compliant with all laws of Uganda governing public procurement.
In that letter, the attorney general’s chambers allowed the usage of non-tax revenue collected by UCC to purchase vehicles for their mother ministry as follows: use of Ugx950m to purchase two brand new 2022 model vehicles for ministers at ICT & national guidance from Cadam enterprises Ltd. Another Ugx949m was for buying 5 double cabin pickup trucks from M/S Victoria Motors Ltd to facilitate activities related to ICT development.
The relevant documents, letters and correspondences this investigator has seen show that UCC and the mother ministry had a memorandum of understanding that was put in place long before Professor Aminah became permanent secretary.
The agreement requires that UCC can use part of the non-tax revenues it collects to pay suppliers of the ministry of different things including vehicles, conference facilities, events management and other things.
That is how UCC money had to be used to purchase the two vehicles, which Muruuli Mukasa called tools of trade to enable ministers to do their work.
The way it works is that the ministry gets a supplier with whom they sign a contract and get the goods or supplies delivered but the tax invoices for payment are sent to UCC because it’s supposed, as per the MoU, to use part of the NTR it collects to pay off creditors for the mother ministry.
This NTR relationship between the ministry and UCC was for many years existing and will remain in place even after Professor Aminah Zawedde has left the stage.
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