Why Baryamureeba has no moral authority to condemn MUBS

By Nick T. Twinamatsiko

I read Prof. Baryamureeba's recent press statement on Makerere University Business School (MUBS) with a lot of interest. I didn't find it surprising that he had been dismissed from the MUBS council.

I noticed, way back in May, that his position at the institution had become untenable, and actually wrote a media article advising him to resign. Fagil Mandy resigned when he found himself in similar circumstances.

I resigned earlier this year when I realized that I didn't have enough power or support to fix the rot in Uganda Business and Technical Examinations Board (UBTEB), the agency that I worked for. Incidentally, I had a conversation with Prof. Baryamureeba during the period of the resignation notice.

He is the chairperson of the Board, so I sent him a 20-page document on the rot in the agency, and then, at his suggestion, we met to discuss it. Our discussion showed me that he was too entangled in the mess to fix it, so I petitioned the Inspectorate General of Government and the Minister of Education.

Three months have now passed since I submitted those petitions. Perhaps investigations are still ongoing; perhaps the petitions were shelved. But I am satisfied that I did the most that I could do about the situation.

In Prof. Baryamureeba's press statement, he listed the forms of corruption at MUBS, and you could think that he was taking them from the document I sent him about the rot at UBTEB. The only difference is that whereas, in his statement, he doesn't give specific cases, I gave such cases in mine.

For instance, he says there are illegal recruitments at MUBS without citing specific cases, whereas, in the document I sent him and the petitions I sent to the IGG, I cited specific cases of recruitments that blatantly contravened the UBTEB Human Resource Manual. He merely talks of mismanagement and abuse of resources, whereas, in the document I sent him, I gave specific instances of such mismanagement and abuse.

As I read his press statement, and as I recalled that, only five months ago, he wrote a letter recommending Prof. Balunywa for reappointment, I wondered why, if MUBS is rotten to the degree he alleges, he wanted the principal perpetrator of the rot to continue in office. In the statements that he made online amidst the controversy over Balunywa's reappointment, he said that he had withdrawn his recommendation after realising that the Principal was already above 60 years of age.

Therefore, if it hadn't been for age, he wouldn't have had any problem with Prof. Balunywa continuing in office. And I strongly believe that if they hadn't clashed, Prof. Baryamureeba wouldn't now be telling the world about the rot at MUBS. He clearly waited until he had a fight with those he calls the perpetrators of the rot, and until he lost the fight, to make his allegations. Perhaps, even with UBTEB, it is when, if ever, he clashes with the top managers, that he will call out the rot at the agency.

Prof. Baryamureeba has appealed to the IGG and the Ministry of Education to investigate his allegations of the rot at MUBS. I appeal to the same entities to investigate the issues in my petitions, which I submitted three months ago. It may turn out that the MUBS petitioner doubles as the UBTEB culprit. Indeed, it may even turn out that the MUBS petitioner doubles as the MUBS culprit, for his silence over all those years may be construed as a form of complicity. The MUBS Council members have resolved to censure their chairperson. I urge the UBTEB Board members to consider doing the same if they care whether or not the agency fulfils its mandate.

The writer a civil engineer and the CEO of Kisana Consults Ltd