Embassy to account for 1,000 passports

Oct 14, 2003

THE Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has directed Uganda’s embassy in Washington to account for 1,000 passports issued by the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

By Joyce Namutebi
THE Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has directed Uganda’s embassy in Washington to account for 1,000 passports issued by the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The committee yesterday directed the Permanent Secretary, Dr. S.P. Kagoda, to write to the embassy informing them of the directive to account for the passports within two weeks.

They said they would summon the ambassador at her own cost if the embassy failed to follow the directive.

Kagoda led a team of senior ministry officials to respond to the Auditor General’s queries for the period ending June 30 2001.

Dr. Okullo Epak (Oyam South) chaired the accounts committee.
The AG said revenue and return in respect of 1,000 passports issued to the mission in Washington had not been submitted.

Kagoda said he had not received any returns from Washington.
The AG also said a return from London had skipped 32 passports which were unaccounted for.

Kagoda said London indicated that the 32 skipped passports were damaged and they were willing to send them back if guaranteed about their safety and the cost.

The committee said there was a lot of dissatisfaction in Parliament with the immigration department and added that the ministry did not seem to pay special attention to immigration, despite it generating revenue for the country amounting to sh5b annually.

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