đ¸ War against corruption should be a partnership â IGG Kamya
Oct 19, 2023
Kamya told the workers that when they suffer because of bad roads, there is somebody who took the money and is building a personal mansion somewhere for his family.Â
IGG, Beti Kamya (L) talking to some of the employees of DIT, Lugogo during a visit where she launched investigations into alleged financial mismanagement of the institute. (Photos by Eddie Ssejjoba)
Eddie Ssejjoba
Journalist @New Vision
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Inspector General of Government (IGG) Beti Kamya has called on the public to partner with the Government in its campaign to eliminate corruption.
She says the war against corruption should be a partnership between the Government, which has instruments of authority to prosecute the offenders, and the public who have information about the vice. The Inspector General of Government, Beti Kamya talking to trainees at Lugogo Vocational Training Institute on her visit to the Directorate of Industrial Training (DIT), Lugogo. She launched investigations into the financial mismanagement of DIT IGG Beti Kamya speaking to journalists The director DIT, Dr. Patrick Byakatonda speaking during a meeting with teh IGG An employee giving his views IGG Beti Kamya speaking to DIT employees Some of the employees who attended a meeting with the IGG Some of the employees who attended a meeting with the IGG The director DIT, Dr. Patrick Byakatonda speaking during a meeting with teh IGG Some of the employees who attended a meeting with the IGG Prima Kige, one of the senior staff at DIT taking the IGG around the premises IGG Beti Kamya speaking to one of the officials at DIT
The IGG reiterated her statement that Uganda loses over shillings 10 trillion to corruption per year, out of, for example, a total of shillings 28 trillion that the country collected in the 2022/2023 financial year.
“That is why when you go to hospitals, there is no medicine, the Government sends the money to buy the medicine but along the way, some people pocket it and benefit a few people. That is why we have very bad roads because the money is taken by some people for their use,” she said. 
Kamya was on Wednesday, October 18, 2023, addressing employees of the Directorate of Industrial Training (DIT) at their offices on Jinja Road at Lugogo in Kampala.
Probe opens up at the institute
She led a team of senior investigators but after addressing the workers, she announced a special launch of investigations into the alleged financial mismanagement and lack of transparency in the running of the affairs of the institute. 
She said that based on a whistleblower’s report, the inspectorate had decided to investigate the institute because apart from the funds they receive from the Government, the institute has a scope of other sources of revenue and wanted to establish how the money is utilised.
Kamya told the workers that when they suffer because of bad roads, there is somebody who took the money and is building a personal mansion somewhere for his family. 
“When you go to Mulago Hospital [in Kampala] and there is no medicine and your child dies, it is because somebody took the money (for drugs) and took his child to the United States of America or India for treatment when that money is supposed to be treating all of us,” she said.
Kamya added: “So, corruption hurts all of us so much that is why it is everybody’s duty to get involved in fighting it. I'm not saying you take up sticks and stones and throw them, no, but wherever you are, you can put a brick on the war against corruption”. 
She asked the workers to ‘fire a bullet’ against corruption wherever they are by passing on information to her. “We shall investigate that information and bring the culprits to book, nobody is unimportant in this war as long as you have information,” she said.
The IGG cited the example of a driver who is asked to take his boss in the evening to check on his construction sites, who should pass on the information to her office. She pledged that she would put the boss to task to explain and if he failed to convince her, she would drag him to court and consequently confiscate his property. 
“If he cannot explain to me how he got that money to build that mansion then I will assume he used public funds in his custody,” she said.
Other examples where workers can alert the IGG include practices of recruiting staff using forged academic papers, saying many of the employees who acquire jobs on forged papers were causing untold suffering to the public through burning and collapsing buildings, quack doctors, lawyers, and others. 
“You could be a storekeeper and you notice some wrong information regarding embezzlement, give it to us,” she said, adding that the weapon the inspectorate was going to use to fight corruption was information.
“You have the information that you don’t know what to do with it, but if you give it to me, I will prosecute them and make them leave the job,” she explained. 
Polly Muhairwe, the director of special investigations at the directorate cautioned employees against late reporting for work, saying the IGG arrived at 8:00 am but most of them were not yet in the office, which he said was a sign of corruption.
The director of the institute told the IGG that they have been customers of various investigations since 2012 and assured her that she should expect maximum cooperation. He, however, complained that the institute was facing a crisis of lack of staff, saying only 20 employees were on the government payroll and most of them were office attendants.
He said every year they assess more than 100,000 learners but they were losing a lot of money in hiring people not on government payroll to provide the service.
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