Speaker Among receives audit reports for the financial year 2021/2022 from the Auditor General, John Muwanga.
The Auditor General, John Muwanga (pictured) has confirmed fears of Ugandans, revealing that within the first year of its implementation, already Shs594.7M of the famed Parish Development Model (PDM) has been swindled and remains unaccounted for by various Local Governments.
While handing over his June 2022 Audit Report to Parliament, Muwanga highlighted a cocktail of challenges facing PDM among which included mismanagement of funds, and forgery of academic documents among the parish chiefs meant to oversee the claimed poverty alleviation program.
“PDM Funds amounting to Shs594.7M in five LGs relating to administrative costs, staff costs and gadgets and tools were not adequately supported with the requisite documentation,” he said.
It should be recalled that in 2021/2022, Government launched the PDM, marketing it as a vehicle to alleviate the 39% of households from subsistence economy to money economy and Shs139Bn out of Shs234Bn was released.
The PDM isn’t the first Poverty alleviation program that Government has come up with and in the past others like Emyooga, Youth Livelihood Fund, Operation Wealth Creation, Uganda Women Entrepreneurship Program, Northern Uganda Social Action Fund (NUSAF) but they have all followed the same script of corruption, mismanagement of funds among others.
The Auditor General also queried the academic qualifications of the Parish Chiefs hired to oversee PDM Funds after unearthing forgeries of academic documents noting, “I noted irregularities in the recruitment of Parish Chiefs. For instance, in Butaleja DLG, 15 out of the 39 parish chiefs recruited had forged academic documents, resulting in loss of government funds worth Shs12M.”
Muwanga called on Government to revoke the appointment letter of irregularly appointed parish chiefs and receiver the paid funds and have Police investigate the forgeries.
Also, the report highlighted that funds disbursed to SACCOS varied from one Local Government to another with SACCOS receiving amounts ranging from Shs2.3m to Shs17.8M. in addition, and 1,502 SACCOS in 70 LGs did not receive any funding, with Government attributing the funding variations to lack of accurate data on the number of parishes and shortfall in releases.
Additionally, Shs29.5Bn meant for revolving funds in 49 LGs was transferred to 3,214 SACCOS that were neither registered under the Cooperative Societies Act nor had signed Parish Revolving Fund financing agreements.
The Auditor General also revealed that Shs79.2Bn paid to 8,703 SACCOS as revolving funds in 169 LGs remained idle on the SACCO bank accounts. The failure to timely utilize funds delays the achievements of the PDN objective of improving community livelihoods.
The Audit report also highlighted that Shs17.5Bn was repurposed from purchase of gadgets and tools staff, costs and administrative costs to the revolving fund in 146 LD without authorization contrary to Regulation 16(1) of the PFMR 2016.
The report findings are to be scrutunised by Parliaments’ Accountability Committees before a final decision is taken by Parliament.
