World Bank ends funding to privatisation process

Mar 18, 2006

The World Bank’s latest sponsorship programme of the privatisation process has come to an end, an official at the bank has said.

By Sylvia Juuko
The World Bank’s latest sponsorship programme of the privatisation process has come to an end, an official at the bank has said.

The Privatisation and the Utility Sector Reform Project’s (PUSRP) latest phase commenced on January 31, 2001 and ended on January 31, 2006. PUSRP is co-funded by the Government.

“The PUSRP completed its natural lifecycle on January 31, 2006 having satisfactorily implemented its key components. Therefore, there was no need to extend the project, whose development objectives were met,” the bank official said.

The PUSRP was financed by an International Development Assistance’s credit of $48.5m (about sh88b) with counterpart funding from the Government.

“The actual funds disbursed by the bank todate are $29m (sh52.6b). This amount will change and can only be confirmed once all commitments have been paid by June 2006,” the official said.

Recent reports said the World Bank was unhappy with political interference and lack of transparency.

But the Privatisation Units’s (PU) spokesman, Jim Mugunga, denied the bank had ended funding due to political interference.

Mugunga said, “I do not think the World Bank exited because of the perceived political interference otherwise they would have walked away during the Uganda Commercial Bank saga. We should not forget that the bank was a partner in this project and could not shoulder the country indefinitely. By the conclusion of the project, we had done over 80% of the work.”
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