Inside govt’s plan to trim its agencies

At least 2,200 people currently in the employment of government agencies, commissions and authorities that are set to be rationalised will be offloaded back into the job market when the government implements the exercise.

The rationalisation process was embarked on following a September 10, 2018 Cabinet decision to merge or collapse more than 60 government agencies and commissions.

Mr Muhammad Muwanga Kivumbi, the shadow Finance minister, had earlier told Monitor that the rationalisation programme had stalled.  The Butambala County lawmaker accused the government of having embarked on the programme without conducting thorough studies around its implications.

“Typical of the way NRM (National Resistance Movement) works, they announced before they made a profound policy. They do not have a policy framework to execute rationalisation as a government. They had not done a cost benefit analysis, they had not calculated the political and economic implications,” he said.

In an interview with Monitor, the Public Service ministry roundly dismissed Mr Muwanga Kivumbi’s assertions.

“It is not true that nothing has happened. Rationalisation is a process. That is why the Minister of Public Service was saying we are giving ourselves two to three years within which to rationalise,” Ms Allen Kakama, the Commissioner of Management Services at the Public Service ministry, said, adding, “From June 2021 to today, we are now two years and two months. The third year is ending in June 2024.”

Mr Wilson Muruli Mukasa, the Public Service minister, told the media on August 1, 2019 that the government had chosen to subject the process to further scrutiny.

“What is important is that we are still on course,” he hastened to add back then. “We (the government) gave ourselves two to three years within which to achieve that. We are still within our time.”

Cost implications
In our interview with Ms Kakama, she disclosed that the Cabinet has already approved payment of at least Shs79.3 billion in gratuity and severance packages to the 2,200 people who will be laid off.

“We (the Public Service ministry) have already calculated the severance packages and gratuity. Cabinet approved the money, Shs79.3 billion, but we are saving Shs956 billion out of the rationalisation exercise,” she said.

The proposed merger was part of a mega reorganisation plan aimed at, among others, realigning functions of agencies, as well as prevention of duplication of roles and wastage of public funds. The decision was precipitated by two reports in 2017 on wasteful expenditure in the government following studies by President Museveni’s younger brother, Gen Caleb Akandwanaho, alias Salim Saleh, and the Internal Security Organisation (ISO). The reports recommended the merger or abolition of some of the government agencies.

ISO recommended reforms by way of abolishing and merging agencies with duplicating roles with a view of cutting down on wasteful expenditure and using the savings for other purposes, including the enhancement of civil servants’ salaries.

A section of lawmakers led by Mr Solomon Silwanyi, who was at the time the deputy chairperson of the NRM Caucus, also weighed in with a report on how the mergers would be effected. On May 10, 2022, an Ad Hoc Committee also released a report on the same exercise.

Legal framework
Mr Muwanga Kivumbi had also accused the government of having failed to initiate the process of repealing some of the laws that facilitated the creation of some of the government agencies that have been lined up for rationalisation.

“Why have they not yet come to Parliament? All these agencies are creations of Acts of Parliament. You, therefore, cannot move against them without coming to Parliament to repeal the Acts that created them. They are creatures of the law, so you cannot disband them by making pronouncements,” the legislator said.

Ms Kakama has, however, has since told Monitor that the government, through the office of the Attorney General, has already come up with the necessary pieces of legislation.

“The laws had to be realigned to the decisions of [the] Cabinet. Some laws have to be repealed and others have to be amended in order to facilitate the process. We have come up with draft bills,” she revealed.

The five draft bills are the Omnibus Bill, which is addressing the merger of about 52 institutions. These include the Constitutional Review Bill; the Health Professionals’ Council Bill; the Tribunals Bill, meant to cater to institutions such as the tax tribunal; and the Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Bill, earmarked for vocational and technical education.

“The bills have been reviewed and approved by [the] Cabinet and they have been gazetted. The Attorney General had already put them in a Memorandum ahead of submission to Parliament. That should happen very soon,” Ms Kakama said.

Implementation
Monitor has reliably learnt that now, after nearly three years of back-and-forth movement, the plan is finally set to be implemented. We understand that this will be at the tail end of this financial year (2023/2024) and roll into the 2024/2025 financial year.   “Our target is that by June 2024, we will have started with what farmers would call the low-lying fruits—those that are keen on being fast-tracked,” Ms Kakama said.

Agencies that have been lined up for rationalisation have for some time now been under instructions not to employ any people on contracts that go beyond June 2024. Those who have handed contracts that run beyond that are, however, to be paid off in lieu of termination of contracts.

“If you have a contract that runs across the time (June 2024), you either get gratuity, severance packages or pension depending on whether you are pensionable or are eligible for any of those. If your contract is still running at the time the agency is rationalised, we shall pay you as per the provisions of the human resource manual of the agency at the time,” Ms Kakama said.

First in queue
Some of those that have been lined up to commence the process are the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), which will be merged with the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre (UWEC). Elsewhere, the Allied Health Examinations Board and the Nurses and Midwives Examinations Board will also be conflated.

“UWA and UWEC did not have many issues because they see themselves as homogenous and were ready to work together,” Ms Kakama explained.

The planned expeditious merger of the Allied Health Examinations Board and the Nurses and Midwives Examinations Board has been informed by the fact that their examinations calendar falls within the period around the end of one financial year and the beginning of another.