OPM officials sent to Anti-Corruption Court

KAMPALA - The case in which four top officials from the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) accused of inflating prices of COVID-19 relief food has been forwarded to the Anti-Corruption Division of the High Court (ACD) for trial.

Buganda Road Court Grade One Magistrate, Olga Karungi issued the ruling on Wednesday after the Director of Public Prosecutions preferred more 24 counts against the accused.

The accused are the Permanent Secretary, Christine Guwatudde, Joel Wanjala, the undersecretary and accounting officer, Martin Owor, the commissioner disaster preparedness, also head of the COVID-19 task force, and Fred Lutimba, the assistant commissioner in charge of procurement in the OPM office.

The group whom court did not allow to plea to fresh charges against them until they return to the ACD, will battle charges of abuse of office, fraudulent false accounting, corruption and colluding to commit a fraudulent practice.

The charges contravene sections 2 (i), 11 (1), 23 (b) of the Anti- Corruption Act, 2009 and 95 (1a) (a) of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act, 2003, as amended.

"Considering the fact that this court has jurisdiction of the case, in particular, I am satisfied that there is a specialised court to handle cases of this matter. I, therefore, forward this case file to the Anti-Corruption Court for trial," Karungi ruled.

The arrest

The four, currently on bail, were in April arrested by the State House Anti-Corruption Unit headed by Lt. Col Edith Nakalema following President Museveni's order to investigate alleged irregularities in the COVID-19 related food procurement exercise.

Upon arrest, they were handed over to detectives attached to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), who later arraigned them in court.

The charges

Prosecution purports that on April 1, 2020, at the OPM situate at plot 9-11, Apollo Kaggwa Road, in Kampala, Guwatudde and Lutimba being employed in the OPM, did an arbitrary act, prejudicial to the interest of their employer, to wit, prepared and issued an award letter to Aponye (U) Ltd for the supply of 2m kilograms of maize meal at sh3, 000 per kg worth sh6b, as food relief items for COVID-19, in total disregard of the procurement procedures.

The accused also allegedly did an arbitrary act when they awarded Mandela Millers Ltd to supply 3m kgs of maize meal at sh3, 000 per kg worth sh9b, as relief items for COVID-19, in total disregard of the procurement procedures.

The four are also accused of colluding together, to commit a fraudulent practice during the procurement of food relief items for COVID-19, in total disregard of the procurement procedures.

The case was adjourned to July 23, 2020, for trial at the Kololo based ACD.