Their core mandate is to develop, promote and control sports activities in Uganda on behalf of government, under the Ministry of Education and Sports.

In so doing they hunt and crack down on those federations that don’t abide by the government regulations and the law that governs sports.

Two weeks ago, fortunes turned full circle when parliament; which passes laws for the good governance of the country, opened a Pandora's box when they tasked a selected committee to investigate the mismanagement of sports funds at the National Council of Sports (NCS). Bugiri Municipality MP, Asuman Basalirwa, moved the motion. The hunter had become the hunted.

Different federation heads have volunteered information about the suspicious manner in which NCS apportions funds in total disregard of ministry guidelines while parliamentarians are up in arms with the finance ministry for arbitrarily altering the sports budget allocations that have been approved.

It’s too early to make blatant accusations against anyone at NCS of stealing but there’s a strong case for mismanagement and misappropriation of funds. When you hear that NCS contractors and suppliers are normally paid promptly while the sports federations with teams waiting to represent the country at different continental competitions continuously withdraw for lack of funding, you begin to smell the coffee.

The odd case of NCS officials routinely outnumbering athletes at international events or taking up the bulk of available slots for officials accompanying the teams is irking. No one but the NCS leadership knows the criteria for selection of these officials and their specific roles are never defined. What is, without doubt, is that in all cases, hundreds of millions of shillings are spent on their allowances. Uglier scenarios have been presented.

That it is now a habit for NCS to submit doctored accountability to the ministry of finance; indicating inflated sums allegedly disbursed to the federations as part of their quota when the alleged recipients have absolutely no clue about the alleged disbursement. This scenario explains why so often, the federations are accused of misappropriating funds when in actual fact, it’s officials at NCS who short-changed the money.

“When you hear that NCS contractors and suppliers are normally paid promptly while the sports federations with teams waiting to represent the country at different continental competitions continuously withdraw for lack of funding, you begin to smell the coffee.”

 In retrospect, one begins to understand why NCS is usually coy about reigning in hard on federations that refuse to account for government money given to them, for fear of exposing themselves.

Where NCS have had an opportunity to defend themselves, they have argued that the delay by the finance ministry to release approved funds as appropriated by parliament forces the body to make hard decisions – including borrowing from money lenders or even dipping their hands into their own pockets – just to ensure that our teams don’t get fined for not showing up at international events.

But why would an individual fund a national team from his own pocket or own sources when a whole budget has been approved by the primary stakeholder and sponsor; government? While the federations are warring between themselves as they accuse each other of being hand-picked by NCS for special attention depending on the proxies there in, the chance to come out as a single voice to expose NCS; aware that parliament and the public are keenly following, could not be let pass.

The big dilemma If it means temporary diverting attention away from themselves, having been at the receiving end of public criticism for years, the federations will not cover up for their supervising body. If the parliamentary investigating committee follows up on it’s threat to also summon players and match officials to give their testimony regarding their own experiences as stakeholders, panic could set in on the side of the federations.

Accountability has always indicated that hundreds of millions from the budget are spent on payments to officials and players.

At the end of the day, it will come down to the political will to get to the bottom of all this. Suppose the committee reports from its findings that NCS top management is culpable, what would be the next course of action? And suppose it’s found the federations are using NCS as a diversion from their own culpability, what will parliament do? That is the question.