DPP questioned on case backlog

PARLIAMENT. Officials from the Directorate of Public Prosecutions had a rough day before the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament yesterday when they failed to justify slow progress on cases.
The officials led by the Deputy Director, Mr Amos Ngolobe, were appearing to answer audit queries for the Financial Year 2015-16 and 2016-2017.
In both years, the Auditor General, Mr John Muwanga, noted that the directorate had managed to handle only 40 per cent of the cases.
“There is a high rate of case registration by the Directorate, and the disposal of the cases has not been robust thus creating case backlogs,” Mr Muwanga stated.
The Auditor General further noted that analysis of the cases performance report at the Directorate for the last two financial years indicated that the categories of criminal cases being handled by the Directorate are 34 in number and include among others; murder, aggravated robbery, treason, rape, man slaughter, theft, assault and forgery.
“I observed that outstanding cases in the financial year ended 30th June 2016 were 395,962 [while in] the year 2016/2017, the closing balance stood at 462,512,” Mr Muwanga noted.
The Directorate’s performance in case disposal in 2016-2017 was 11 per cent compared to 25 per cent in the previous financial year, the Auditor General further noted.
“The high rate of case registration compared to the disposal has not been robust enough thus creating case backlog; this affected timely delivery of justice to the affected persons,” Mr Muwanga said.
Most recorded cases that were criminal in nature included among others; murder, aggravated robbery, treason, rape and manslaughter. Others were theft, assault and forgery.
Mr Ngolobe, in his response, attributed the incident to inadequate staffing levels to manage the ever growing cases.
He said that despite requests for financial support to boost their team, the Ministry of Finance has only showed them a closed year despite the need to hire employees, including state attorneys and other staff.
Meanwhile, Mr Ngolobe was forced to apologise to the committee after MPs realised that the DPP diverted Shs102.6 million to other items which were not budgeted for.
Ntungamo Municipality MP Gerald Karuhanga who chaired the committee pressed DPP officials to explain why they paid themselves allowances against the Public Finance Management Act on budgetary items.
The law requires spending entities to stick to budget requests and allocation approved by parliament.
The MPs agreed to give up to 10 working days to the DPP to harmonise his documents and report back, failure of which will have the auditors queries confirmed as doubtable expenditure.