By Our Spy
Kampala: The Executive Director of Public Procurement and Disposal of Assets Authority (PPDA), Canon Benson Turamye has termed the Inspector General of Government (IGG), Betty Olive Namisango Kamya as inexperienced and dared her to find any stain on him.
Kamya, in a tweet yesterday vowed to revisit the stalled investigations into the Shs17 billion National Water and Sewerage Corporation procurement scandal that PPDA allegedly failed to investigate.
But according to Turamye, he is shocked by Kamya’s interest in a matter that ended over five years back.
Through his proxy, an online media, Turamye blamed this on what he termed Kamya’s failure to discern underlying political and business interests in whistleblowers reports, unlike previous IGGs.
“It is this inexperience that is being exploited by several disgruntled contractors and mafia groups with deep political connections fighting for fatty government contracts,” Turamye is quoted to have said by media.
Turamye also prophesized that Kamya’s investigation of his work will likely have a similar ending to that of UBOS, where she interdicted UBOS bosses basing on a whistleblower’s claims of corruption only for the President to reinstate them after learning Kamya had been misled.
“I want to assure Ugandans that the IG will reopen the Shs17 billion NWSC procurement of prepaid meters without fear or favour,” Kamya tweeted yesterday.
The investigations into the fake prepaid meters is said to have been blocked by Turamye in return for a fatty position for his wife, Ruth Kembabazi at NWSC.
A section of workers at National Water and Sewerage Corporation petitioned IGG to revisit investigations into a stalled probe into the purchase of prepaid meters that developed functionality problems.
The whistleblowers want the IGG to probe the Executive Director of Public Procurement and Disposal of assets Authority (PPDA), Canon Benson Turamye and his counterpart at National Water and sewerage corporation (NWSC) Dr.Silver Mugisha claiming the two were allegedly involved in blocking an investigation into a dubious procurement deal where NWSC procured water prepaid meters with functionality issues at a cost of Shs17 billion.
It is alleged that PPDA Turamye ignored the investigations into the Shs17 billion NWSC procurement deal and instead Turamye exploited how he could benefit from the dubious procurement deal.
According to the whistleblower’s report submitted to IGG last year, the deal would now have NWSC Boss Dr. Silver Mugisha promote Turamye’s wife so that on the other hand the PPDA boss Turamye could kill the investigation.
Ruth Kembabazi, Turamye’s wife had been recruited by NWSC as a senior Internal Auditor on August 6, 2018 at a salary scale of 3.1. However, in a surprise move that shocked senior staff at NWSC, Mugisha abruptly promoted Kembabazi to Senior Compliance Officer on September 2, 2020, earning her a salary scale of 3.10, which is almost the salary scale of principal officers at NWSC.
Whistleblowers say Mugisha ignored to promote staff who had worked for five years at that public company, well knowing that Kembabazi’s promotion would save him from PPDA investigation as agreed with Turamye.
The whistleblowers says that it is this stalled investigation that led to the fallout between former NWSC board chairman Eng. Christopher Ebal.
The jilted staff at NWSC still wonder what special qualifications, skills and experience Kembabazi possessed to attain to be promoted in a period of just two years at NWSC.
On the other hand, the rest of PPDA investigators have never forgiven Turamye for aborting the investigation of the Shs17 billion dubious procurement and are calling for a hammer to fall on his head. Turamye is accused in many several other dealings.
Mr Turamye has worked at PDDA for more than 10 years before he was appointed by the board to the position of Executive director. However, the latest allegations on him involving NWSC could drag NWSC into mad given that Eng. Mugisha and his predecessor have worked hard to turn around the corporation.
Eng. Mugisha did not deny the allegations that they procured fake meters systems. He in fact confirmed that indeed this happened but PPDA has since cleared the ‘mess’ and have since moved past that.
”Since this matter has been thrown into the public domain, I prefer to relay facts, first:
(1) NWSC procured prepaid meters for Government institutions about 8yrs ago.
(2) The meters (and systems) developed functionality challenges within 2yrs of operation, which was unusual.
(3) NWSC took administrative measures with the supplier to mitigate any financial loss to the corporation. This involved withholding equivalent payments to the supplier and cashing performance security
(4) About 3yrs ago, PPDA carried out a comprehensive performance audit on the matter, in accordance with the law. PPDA report returned a raft of measures and recommendations that NWSC management and Board, have since acted on fully.
(5) NWSC is currently developing its own prepaid meter technology, based on experiences we have had with prepaid meters.
(6) Similar allegations were brought to the floor of the 10th Parliament. We gave our correct side of the story and it was understood,” he posted in one of the WhatsApp groups he belongs to.
