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Head of State House Investors Protection Unit Col. Edith Nakalema has urged families to groom children with the ability to fight corruption.

"The problem we have is that families are breeding a bad habit of rewarding those who perform well with huge gifts like cars. By simply doing that you bribe them to achieve the targets," Nakalema says.

According to Nakalema families should play an important role in the ethical moulding of young people so that their teachers at school just enforce honesty and trustworthiness.

She made the call during the anti-corruption convention 2023 held under the theme: Strengthening Partnerships in the War Against Corruption. The event was on Thursday at the Golf Course Hotel in Kampala.

Nakalema urged for the protection of investors to avoid them falling into the hands of corrupt individuals.

"We get taxes from local and foreign investors, jobs for the youth, and technology transfer that's why investors must be jealousy protected," Nakalema said.

Nakalema urged stakeholders to unite against corruption otherwise, every effort towards the zeal to fight the vice collectively may fail.

According to Inspector General of Government Beti Kamya, the total cost of corruption in Uganda is estimated to be sh9.144 trillion per year which is equivalent to 44% of total government revenue in 2019.

Kamya says corruption takes two forms: Direct and indirect. Direct costs include all those costs that are attributed to corrupt acts.



This can be a cost to the public budget (either to the Ugandan government or donor governments providing aid to the Ugandan budget); or a cost to citizens who are required to pay a bribe to get a public service.

Indirect costs are all those costs that are hard to measure in exact monetary terms. They are a loss to society when resources are not allocated to the public budget and more broadly, to the whole economy in the best possible way. They are the net social cost.

Political will to fight graft still lacking

Aron Mallon Agaba, the executive director of Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda, said although several agencies and Acts have been passed by the Government, the political will to fight corruption by the Government is still wanting.

"There are people who come out and whistleblower corruption, but the Whistleblower Protection Act we have in place is not protecting them sufficiently," he said.

According to him, the country does not have a witness protection law in place which is a big challenge, and the delayed response to cases when citizens report creates apathy.

Uganda has a long way to go in corruption fight

According to Transparency International’s 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), Africa is the most corrupt region in the world.

The index relies on 13 independent data sources and uses a scale of zero to 100, where zero is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean.

Sub-Saharan Africa, the lowest-scoring region got an average score of 33/100, while Western Europe and European Union, the highest-scoring region scored an average of 66/100.

The report indicates that 44 out of 49 countries still score below 50. Uganda in particular scored 27/100 and was ranked 144/180 countries.

This reinforces the urgent need for the Ugandan government to implement existing anticorruption commitments if they are to alleviate the devastating effect of corruption on millions of citizens living in extreme poverty.