By Spy Uganda
This week members of the Committee of Commissions, Statutory Authorities, and State Enterprises (COSASE) raised concerns over the Uganda Tourism Board’s (UTB) excessive expenditures, particularly questioning how UGX1.9Bn could be spent on domestic travel for inspecting accommodation facilities, while only UGX38M was collected in registration and licensing fees from these facilities.
Gerald Nangoli, the Elgon North Constituency MP and his counterpart Martin Muzaale of Buzaaya County were particularly vocal, questioning the justification of such high expenditures on activities that yield minimal revenue.
Nangoli stated, “Travel in land Shs1.958Bn on average if you get this figure and divide by 12 months in a year, it means on a monthly basis, UTB spends Shs163M on inland travel, then travel abroad is Shs1.318Bn.”
Muzaale added, “In what you are trying to justify as a cost of close to Shs3Bn, you are giving us a collection of Shs38m. Does it make any business sense? You spend Shs3Bn and you collect Shs38M. Now, you want to tell Ugandans that you are using Shs3Bn to chase Shs38M, and that is a justification?”
Lilly Ajarova, Chief Executive Officer of UTB, defended the expenditures, explaining that the funds facilitate the Quality Assurance Department’s staff in inspecting accommodation facilities to ensure they meet standards for both local and international tourists.
“The travel inland, part of it is what we use for the domestic campaigns and then the classification and grading of the accommodation facilities because the team has to travel across the country to do the inspection and then they have to go back to do the inventory and assessment to get the grading of the accommodation facilities. However, the registration and licensing that we are collecting is just for the accommodation facilities. The law doesn’t provide for payment of registration of licensing to operators of tour operators, it is only the accommodation facilities,” Ajarova explained.
Muzaale also questioned the Shs590M spent on training the 55 staff employed by UTB, noting, “When you look at staff training, we have Shs590M, workshops, meetings, and seminars. Now, you are meeting to caucus on what? What we expect you to be doing, you aren’t, so which values are attached to these seminars?”
Ajarova clarified that the training includes sessions for hotel and tour operators, with significant expenses allocated to hosting the Pearl of Africa Tourism Expo.
“Earlier on we mentioned about sensitization and awareness that we do for the hotels, tour operators, the trainings that we do for them as well. There are sensitization workshops and meetings with different stakeholders and one of the biggest unit costs is the venue that we have to hire for the Pearl of Africa Tourism Expo at Speke Resort Munyonyo, because this is an international event that brings in international buyers, so we have to pay for the exhibition space and we have to pay rooms for the internationals and it has a big component under that charter of accounts,” she noted.
Despite her explanations, Muzaale remained unconvinced, questioning the logic behind spending such a large sum on staff training.
“Fine, she may explain that, but staff training of Shs590M, against an average of 55 employees, so on average you are spending Shs11M. Why do you take them to train? Do they go for refresher courses? Because Shs11M is tuition for a University student,” he said.
Ajarova further defended the training expenses, stating, “We have different forms of training, first of all, all the staff at UTB are supposed to know the product that we are selling, so one of the things that fall under here is product knowledge, so we take them to the different attractions around the country. But also depending on the profession, there are both national and international refresher trainings that we get to do during the course of the year.”
Muzaale, however, continued to criticize UTB’s spending, insisting that the organization’s expenditures do not yield sufficient results.
“You need to go back and re-examine your expenses, because it is a lot. You can tell us stories here, but the truth of the matter, it is really a lot of money that you are spending on things that don’t add up. Because as the Tourism Board, what we want to see isn’t what is here. For instance, if I went to NBS TV, will I find your promotions there? If I went to NTV, do you have any promotions on that TV? Ideally, I wouldn’t have any problem having billions of money spent on advertising, I would be very comfortable. Now, you are telling me that you are training a finance man, who will be transferred the next day by the Accountant General, you are training him to do what?” he concluded.
