The Directorate of Public Prosecution (DPP) has blamed the National Information and Technology Authority – Uganda (NITA-U) on slow implementation of the Prosecution Case Management Information System (PROCAMIS).
The revelation was made by Amos Ngolobe, the Deputy DPP while appearing before Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to respond to queries raised in the Auditor General’s report.
He was representing his boss Mike Chibita (in featured photo).
Ngolobe said the Directorate could only manage to connect and roll out the system to four field offices and could not roll out to seven field offices due “to external factors especially NITA-U failure to provide internet and lease-line service coverage of the field offices.”
The connected offices are Buganda Road, Mukono, Entebbe and Kololo yet there are 119 stations giving coverage of only 4.4% two years from the system was launched.
The system was procured to end the vice of criminals and errant Police officials who misplace case files to evade prosecution.
The web-based software is also supposed to enable state attorneys and other DPP staff to track exhibits and other forms of evidence to avert their misplacement that usually leads to loss of cases.
According to the Auditor General, the procurement process and the contract was awarded to an American based IT Specialist for the supply of prosecution case Management Information Systems on 28th November 2014 at a cost of USD2.24m approximately Shs8.46bn at current exchange rate.
In 2014/2015, Shs3.95bn representing 50% had been paid to the suppliers and the DPP further spent Shs3.47bn in 2015/2016 on this project.
Auditor General, John Muwanga noted that the expenditure already incurred has been not been commensurate with the implementation pace.
He further highlighted that installation had been done in the offices of Mubende, Mpigi, Makindye, Mwanga II, Jinja and Iganga, however, the system was not yet operational due to lack of internet connectivity and warned that further delays in the implementation and roll out of PROCAMIS may affect the timely achievement of the project objectives.
The Directorate was also faulted for committing a mischarge of expenditure after an audit review of the Directorate payments revealed that Shs102.6m was spent without requisite authority.
The auditors argued that the practice of mischarging expenditure undermines the importance of the budgeting process and leads to financial statement misreporting.
When asked about the matter, Ngolobe apologized for the mischarge saying it came as result of accrued allowances for staff and had to use the funds to cover the debt.
