URA boss wins continental award

Feb 28, 2018

Doris Akol has received the African Leadership Magazine (ALM) Person of the Year Public Service Excellence Award 2018.

PIC: Akol attibuted her recognition to the hard work of the URA team

RECOGNITION OF EXCELLENCE


SOUTH AFRICA - Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) commissioner general Doris Akol has scooped a major continental award, just three years after ascending the helm of the national tax body.

Akol has received the African Leadership Magazine (ALM) Person of the Year Public Service Excellence Award 2018.

Additionally, she was inducted into ALM's Chief Executive Officers Hall of Fame Class of 2018.

Past recipients of the award include Dr Mo Ibrahim, founder, Ibrahim Prize for Leadership, 2010; former Liberia President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, 2011; Atiku Abubakar, former vice-president of Nigeria 2012; Jakaya Kikwete, former president of Tanzania, 2014 and Goodluck Jonathan, the former president of Nigeria, among others.

Akol has in the past been acknowledged locally and internationally for her role in leadership, women empowerment and tax administration.

According to the institution website, the Persons of the Year Award is received by the continent's best political, diplomatic and business leaders contributing to growth and development.

The African Leadership Magazine Persons of the Year Award is in its 6th run.

"We celebrate exemplary leadership and individuals who have contributed to shaping the global perception of the African continent. This group of Africans is one the game-changers, who are doing things differently towards re-positioning the African continent," read a statement on the magazine website.

Regarding the hall of fame induction, it stated, "…..The African Leadership CEO's Hall of Fame will be an exclusive club of top chief executives from across the continent who have continuously exhibited a passion and commitment to diligence, success and transformational leadership in their bid to make Africa prosperous."

Akol was commended for spearheading engagements with the business community, providing accountability platforms for revenue collected, as well as for the servant leadership displayed in the #servedbytheCG campaign.

Plaques signifying the award and the hall of fame conscription were handed over to URA officials Sarah Banage and Vincent Seruma over the weekend at an event held at the Santdon Convention Centre, Johannesburg, South Africa.

Responding to the news, Akol, in a tweet stated: "Kudos to the entire team at URA. This is continental acknowledgement of your excellence in service delivery…"  

Akol attributed her latest accolade to staff, who, she argued, excellently executed the initiatives for which she and, indeed, URA were recognised.
  
In addition to ensuring that the Government has revenue to offer services, Akol has created strategic partnerships with local and international institutions. She has also instilled in her team a culture of service and providing solutions to clients' challenges.    

The African Leadership Magazine is published by African Leadership (UK) Limited, a company registered in the UK. It focuses "on bringing the best of Africa to a global audience, telling the African story from an African perspective while evolving solutions to peculiar challenges being faced by the continent today."  
 
Its mission is to promote innovation, entrepreneurship and development in Africa, hence championing the emergence of a new Africa.

According to the website, profits from the magazine are "ploughed" into providing a future for vulnerable children of Africa through the send a child to school programme.
 
The magazine wholly supports the programme in collaboration with the African Leadership Development Foundation, Inc. USA, the Betwixt and Between Foundation in the US and the Centre for Economic and Leadership Development, Nigeria.

URA is a semi-autonomous institution established in September 1991 by an Act of Parliament. The institution's mandate is assessing, collecting and accounting for tax and non-revenue to the finance ministry.
 

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