State House probes sh2b financial mess at Moroto Hospital

HEALTH

The Health Monitoring Unit (HMU) of State House is investigating the mismanagement of finances worth sh2.3b at Moroto Hospital.

HMU spokesperson, Phiona Abaasa told New Vision that between 2015/16 and 2016/17, the hospital director Filbert Nyeko and a senior accountant Johnson Olero received public funds worth sh2.3b to run the hospital which they allegedly failed to account for it.

Abaasa said that the HMU's investigations that exposed the financial mess at the Hospital started in March after they were tipped off by a community member.

"When our team rushed to the hospital, it unearthed anomalies in the financial accountabilities of funds meant for fuel and general malaise in the running of the facility," she said.

According to HMU, the two officials failed to present payment vouchers to the tune of over sh2.2b in 2015/16 alone and the balance in 2016/17.

When the accused officers were asked to file their defense, they cooked stories. New Vision has learnt that the HMU team from Kampala is camped in Moroto to finalise their investigations.  

"The failure to account for the public funds contravenes section 35 and 29 of the Public Finance Management Regulations," Abaasa said.

Abaasa said that as soon as the investigations are finished, the suspects will be charged with financial mismanagement.

In a related development, a team of HMU officials on Wednesday survived being beaten up by a drunken senior accountant of Moroto Hospital as they went about with their investigations.

Charles Okorom, a senior detective working with HMU told New Vision that Samuel Masette had been on a run for a while and that they were surprised when he showed up drunk and threatened to beat the team up.

"When one of our detectives tried to contain him, the yelling Masette made a fist and hit him hard in the chest. This caused a scuffle when the records officer by the names of Ivan Tusiime who also works at the hospital joined him in hitting the detective," said Abaasa.

New Vision has learnt that the scuffle left the entire staff of Moroto regional referral hospital and the patients who had gathered in shock at the behaviour of the hospital staff.

New Vision has learnt that the two HMU police detectives on the team later overpowered the two and arrested them before driving them to Moroto Central Police Station where they were charged with assault and obstructing an investigation.