Among writes to Finance over PDM cash
The Speaker of Parliament, Ms Anita Among
What you need to know:
- As per the Auditor General’s report, a total of Shs29.5 billion was wired to 3,214 non-existent PDM Savings and (Sacco). It was established that the Shs79.2 billion was wired to 8,703 Saccos as revolving funds remained idle in Sacco bank accounts.
The Speaker of Parliament, Ms Anita Among, has directed the Ministry of Finance to account for Shs1.4 trillion the government sent to different parishes across the country under the Parish Development Model (PDM) project.
In a February 1 letter addressed to the ministry’s Permanent Secretary, Mr Ramathan Ggoobi, Ms Among asked that her office be availed with a full report detailing how the funds have since been appropriated.
“Parliament, in the exercise of its oversight mandate, seeks to establish the status of disbursement of funds under PDM, the information should be clustered by districts,” she stated.
Yesterday, Mr Chris Obore, the director of communications at Parliament, told this publication that the letter was authored by Ms Among in the spirit of ensuring value for money in the programme.
“Her key duty is an oversight on government expenditures, and I am aware that she is interested in knowing that the money for the PDM goes to the intended beneficiaries who are the ordinary poor Ugandans” Mr Obore said.
In a telephone interview, Mr Ggoobi said they are ready to cooperate with Parliament. “We are going to give them all the information they will require because we know they are going to the field. .. ., so we are going to give them through our leader of government business, who is the Prime Minister,” he said.
The Auditor General (AG)’s report for Financial Year 2021/2022 discovered a plethora of glaring irregularities in the management of funds.
Attempts to speak to Local Government Minister Raphael Magyezi over the reported sloppy performance of the PDM in parishes across the country were futile by press time since his telephone number was unavailable.
However, Ms Beatrice Akello Akori, the State Minister for Economic Monitoring, while in Gulu City to examine the government projects recently, remarked that the programme was struggling to make an impact since the planners misfired on priorities.
“These programmes, Emyooga and PDM have issues, the planners did not consider many things and also the money is not reaching the typical poor beneficiaries for whom it was intended,” Ms Akori said.
