Uganda: 200 IGG staff out of contract

By Isaac Mufumba

Operations, including the renewal of contracts for staff at the Inspectorate of Government (IGG), have ground to a halt due to absence of a substantive Inspector General of Government (IGG) and deputy.

The anti-corruption agency can also neither recruit nor promote its staff due to absence of two of its three leading principals who are meant to execute key decisions, including disciplinary action against errant officers.

The office has not had a substantive deputy since July 5 last year when Justice Irene Mulyagonja, who was first appointed to it in April 2012, left after her second and final term as IGG expired.

She was vetted by the Parliament's Appointments Committee and sworn in by President Museveni as judge of the Court of Appeal in December 2019, nearly seven months before her term expired, but the President has since not named a substantive replacement.

Following Justice Mulyagonja's departure, the two deputies, Mr George Bamugemereire and Ms Fauzat Mariam Wangadya, took charge, but Mr Bamugemereire also left in March after his two 4-year terms as Deputy IGG ended.

The spokesperson of the Inspectorate, Ms Munira Ali, told Saturday Monitor that the Inspectorate has been operating with only one Deputy.

"Yes Mr Bamugemereire's contract expired, and he's already left. We now have only one Deputy IGG, Ms Mariam Wangadya".

Sources at the Inspectorate have since indicated that Ms Wangadya second four-year contract is also set to expire in July.

The three top management positions at the anti-corruption institution will, therefore, be vacant unless President Museveni moves to name a substantive IGG and deputies before then.

Paralysis

Whereas Ms Wangandya is holding forte, information available to Saturday Monitor indicates that her hands are tied.

She is limited by the Inspectorate of Government Act, 2002, which pegs the performance of certain functions to the presence of a substantive IGG.

The first casualty of the administrative vacuum have been the staff.

Whereas the Inspectorate usually employees people on three or four-year contracts renewable upon satisfactory performance, contracts of more than half of the 480 staff of the Inspectorate cannot be renewed.

Speaking to Saturday Monitor during the course of the week, Ms Munira said the development is attributed to lack of a substantive IGG.

Section 7 of the IGG Act, 2002, provides for the establishment of an Appointments Board for the Inspectorate, chaired by the IGG with the two deputies as members. It is that board that handles issues of employment at the Inspectorate.

"Contracts cannot be renewed because the renewal of contracts is done by the appointments board and that board is chaired by the IGG and the two deputies sit on it. Because we do not have a substantive IGG, the board cannot sit to review people's requests for renewal of contracts," Ms Munira said.

Employees who fall in that category, Saturday Monitor has learnt, have since been given what was described as "administrative extensions" to their contracts, but the extensions are for only 6 months, which is not going down well with the workers.

But the Permanent Secretary and Accounting Officer at the Inspectorate, Ms Rose Kafeero, sought to downplay the situation.

"As far as I know, there is nobody who has no contract. The board left very clear instructions which we are following to the letter... everybody has a contract whether long-term or short-term. There is a standing decision which we are following until we have a Board," Ms Kafeero said.

Saturday Monitor has learnt that recruitments, appointments and promotions have also been affected because all those are functions of an Appointments Boards, which is not in place.

The situation, according to sources, has affected performance of an institution that has until recently been calling for additional funding from the government to allow it employ more people to take on numerous tasks.

The Inspectorate had, in its biannual performance report to Parliament for the period between January and June 2020, blamed an increase on backlog cases on inadequate staffing levels both at the headquarters and at its 16 regional offices.

Our sources indicate that disciplinary action cannot be taken against errant officers because of the same problem.

The only area around employment which the current administration can deal with is the handling of resignation letters, but those too have to be passed onto the Appointments' Board whenever it will be constituted.

Sections 7(2)(c) of the IGG Act lists "the making of regulations for the discipline of officers and other employees of the Inspectorate" as one of the functions of the Appointments Board.

Low morale

Sources say employees' morale and performance levels have dipped because of uncertainty surrounding their future.

Employees who have carried on with work after having been handed administrative renewals are said to be afraid of taking decisive action for fear of ending up in the bad books of the next IGG and deputies.

"We are in transition so everyone is trying to be very careful not to be caught on the wrong side. When new management comes in, I shouldn't be accused that I did this or that. That is what most people are afraid of," one of the employees told Saturday Monitor.

About 40 investigators whose contracts had expired did not have them renewed in 2005 after Mr Museveni appointed Justice Faith Mwondha and Mr Raphael Baku as IGG and Deputy. It is believed that their contracts were not renewed because they had stepped on the toes of some powerful people during the transition, a situation which the staff at the Inspectorate are keen to avoid.

In April 2012, the Constitutional Court halted legal proceedings against ministers Sam Kutesa and Mwesigwa Rukutana and the government Chief Whip then, Mr John Nasasira, challenged the IGG's power to prosecute or cause their prosecution when the office was not fully constituted as provided for by the IGG Act.

The court ruled in favour of the trio who had been charged in December 2011 with abuse of office and causing financial loss of Shs14 billion that had been earmarked for work on the completion of Speke Resort Munyonyo in the run up to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) 2007.

"... our holding is that the Inspectorate of Government must be in existence when fully constituted as provided for in... the Constitution and... the Inspectorate of Government Act so as to be able to prosecute or cause prosecution of cases involving corruption, abuse of authority or of public office," ruled Justices Elizabeth Mpagi Bahigeine, Steven Kavuma, Augustine Nshimye, Arach Amoko and Remmy Kasule.

Doubts over reports

The Inspectorate has since July last year presented at least two reports to Parliament, but questions are now being raised about the legal status of those other reports and the investigations that it has been carrying out.

However, former Shadow Attorney General and Ndorwa East MP, Mr Wilfred Niwagaba, says the reports and outcomes of the office's investigations cannot be rendered illegal because the inspectorate is not fully constituted.

"Reports by their very nature, are just informative. The only challenge would be where the actions of the office have to do with any judicial systems," Mr Niwagaba says.

Crisis

Whereas the Inspectorate usually employees people on three or four-year contracts renewable upon satisfactory performance, contracts of more than half of the 480 staff of the Inspectorate cannot be renewed. Speaking to Saturday Monitor during the course of the week, the spokesperson of the Inspectorate, Ms Munira Ali, said the development is attributed to lack of a substantive IGG.

This article was originally published by the Daily Monitor. [Photo: Halima Athumani/VOA News]