The Inspectorate of Government says it is investigating "several" tax evasion cases in the country.

Beti Kamya Turwomwe, the head of the entity, said some of those investigations are looking into issues of "tax exemptions to non-deserving people."

"These days they are called ngamba nogu. If you have a ngamba nogu (powerful person in government) you can get a tax exemption when you don't even deserve it," she said.

Kamya, who did not name the individuals or entities being investigated, revealed that some of the tax fraud cases involve falsification of the country of origin of goods to avoid paying the taxes.

"You find goods that are supposed to be consumed in Uganda but they are consigned to another country like transit goods, but they are not in transit. They are offloaded here in Uganda and they are sold and they don't pay taxes.

"When we go to the border post where they are supposed to have passed, we find they didn't even pass there.”

She said sometimes the goods pass the border but are not registered, adding: "There are so many loopholes which you need to deal with before you overload the poor Ugandan taxpayer who does not even get the services they deserve."

There is a need to ensure the taxpayer gets value for the money of taxes they pay, she said.

She made the revelations while appearing at a local radio talk show in Kampala on Saturday, April 6, 2024.

Lavish expenditures  

According to her, there is also a need to check lavish expenditure, some of which is exemplified in civil servants in top offices driving top-of-the-range vehicles and travelling abroad at the expense of the Ugandan taxpayer.

She said when she was in Parliament as a Member of Parliament for Rubaga, she was at once delegated by the Speaker of Parliament to visit UNAA, an association of Ugandans living and working in North America.

"What I saw in UNAA, I said I would not go back of official visit,” she said.

She said while the annual meeting of the association is supposed to serve the purpose of community for Ugandans who cannot come back home to interact with government officials, it has turned into a civil servants dominated event. 

She said most of these travel from the country to America using taxpayers' money to do nothing but spend.

"You find Ugandans who travelled business class, and got big per diems to go to UNAA and talk to themselves," she said, adding that as well as the event in America, there was also a similar lavish event in the United Kingdom.

"We need to audit this kind of consumption which is so overburdening the taxpayer," she added. 

She said some of the money ending up in such consumptive behaviour is money borrowed as loans from foreign lenders by the government.

"When I was in Cabinet, almost every month we passed a loan and the loans end up in white elephant projects and most of the money is stolen in corruption,” she said, adding that their research shows that 50 per cent of the money is lost through procurement.