Andima replaces Ssali as probe gathers pace

Trade minister Francis Mwebesa has named Geraldine Ssali’s replacement as the ministry’s top accounting officer, Sunday Monitor has learnt.

In a terse response to the Secretary to the Treasury’s October 3 letter, Minister Mwebesa makes clear his nomination of “Mr Alfred Oyo Andima, undersecretary, finance and administration, Ministry of Trade, Industry and Cooperatives as the accounting officer for the ministry.”

Mr Ramathan Ggoobi, who is also the Permanent Secretary in the Finance ministry, had in the October 3 letter instructed Minister Mwebesa to expedite the naming of a new accounting officer for the Trade ministry after stripping Ms Ssali of her powers.

The decision to kick out Ms Ssali was premised on recommendations enshrined in a Parliament committee report. The Committee on Trade under the chairmanship of Mr Mwine Mpaka (Mbarara South) recommended action to be taken against Ms Ssali for the irregularities done on her watch as the accounting officer of the Trade ministry.

In his letter, Mr Ggoobi indicated that Ms Ssali’s removal from office is intended to allow other state actors to institute and conduct investigations into, among others, the allegations of misappropriation of funds at the Trade ministry.

“The purpose of this letter, therefore, is to request you as the supervising political head of the ministry to nominate a suitable officer, for my appointment, to execute the duties of the accounting officer, Ministry of Trade, Industry and Co-operatives as allegations against Ms Geraldine Ssali and others are being investigated,” Mr Ggoobi wrote.

Mr Mpaka hailed the recent developments, telling this publication that they affirmed the work of the House committee he chairs.

“Parliament has started achieving. At least now there’s some light that some people are taking our work is being taken seriously,” Mr Mpaka said before saying the House is yet to receive the official communication from the Trade ministry on the same.

Our efforts to get a comment from Ms Ssali were unsuccessful by press time.

More mess unearthed

In another twist, Mr Mpaka’s committee is at the tail-end of investigations into how an undisclosed amount of money, believed to be in billions, was allegedly swindled or abused by some cooperatives leaders. It is further alleged that they did this in cahoots with Trade ministry officials and/or some politicians.

The probe was on August 29 sanctioned by Speaker Anita Among who asked that the various cooperatives in the country be subjected to a value-for-money audit. The probe, which has been held behind closed doors, has since quizzed officials from the Trade, Finance, and Justice ministries. Various leaders from different cooperatives have also been put on the spot.

“Unlike other investigations where you look at the documentation, the way this money has been misused we were relying more on testimonies by various witnesses,” Mr Mpaka said of the probe’s veil of secrecy, adding that since some of the people probe “are going to be state witnesses […] we needed recorded sessions and we needed to create an environment where someone is going to testify freely.”

He further noted that, since they are dealing with cash transactions and not documents, the closed sessions make “witnesses testify without being intimidated and being in fear of their lives.” That notwithstanding, the Trade committee has run into several speed bumps, Mr Mpaka disclosed, trying to verify claims levelled against some cooperatives.

“There are some meetings we had tabled with them like East Mengo Cooperative are elusive and we have reason to believe that they are hiding something because we have invited them three times and they have not appeared,” Mr Mpaka told Sunday Monitor.

He added: “So we have requested the help of the Police to look for these people and bring them. There are about five cooperatives, and we also have some witnesses that have vanished. So we are looking for these witnesses as we analyse the documentation.”