Museveni blames Atiak Sugar failure on MPs

President Museveni has accused Members of Parliament of frustrating his vision to revive Atiak Sugar Ltd, nearly a year after the company suspended operations.

While responding to concerns raised by Acholi leaders over the idle sugar processing factory and a vast sugar plantation that is now wasting in wildfires, Mr Museveni said Parliament was to blame for the failure of the plant.

The President had convened a meeting with Acholi political, religious and cultural leaders at Barlegi State Lodge in Okwang Sub-county, Otuke District to brief them on government plans to pacify the Acholi region.

 Mr Museveni said Parliament refused to support his plans to bail out the sugar-producing company, whose operations have since commissioning been limping.

“Atiak Sugar is paralysed by Parliament. I wanted to support them, I made proposals on how to support them but they were blocked by Parliament, so I have not had time to go to war with Parliament because I am still busy with the issue of the Karimojong raiders, but I will get the space and sort out that issue.”

Mr Museveni said upon handling the Karamoja cattle rustling dilemma in the north, he would return to Kampala to concentrate on sorting out the Atiak Sugar problem.

Background

In November, MPs gave the Auditor General a directive to institute a value-for-money audit into Atiak Sugar Ltd, which further deepened the company’s quandary after it had earlier last year suspended operations due to lack of raw materials.

The Speaker of Parliament, Ms Anita Among, directed the Auditor General, Mr John Muwanga, to institute an audit into the vast sums of government monies pumped into the factory.

“Of recent, we gave out money and bought shares with Roko Construction Company, we also bought shares with Atiak Sugar Factory. So we need an audit of that money that has gone to those institutions so that we know how many shares we have, and what rights we have,” Ms Among said then.

Ms Among’s call made in line with Section 31 of the Public-Private Partnership Act, 2015 is part of the string of measures that the House and or other institutions hope to scrutinise how such funds are used.

Lawmakers have, however, continued to question why the government’s stakes in it have remained significantly low compared to that of Horyal Investments despite the huge capital portfolio injected in to the venture.

In September 2021, the Parliament Committee on Trade questioned why the government—the lowest shareholder in Atiak Sugar Limited—continues to invest the most money in the factory.

 The committee also questioned the circumstances under which Naads contracted the company to clear, plant, and harvest sugarcane valued at Shs54 billion instead of working directly with the out-growers.  

The MPs declined to endorse Ms Hersi’s request to the government, reasoning that there was a need for proof that her investment was making a substantial contribution to the economy.

 The production of sugar at the factory has been put on halt and will only resume in two years, according to Mr Jackson Hamilton Ogwang, the Naads Zonal agricultural development officer in charge of the Acholi Sub-region.

Trouble brews for House clerk

Meanwhile, yesterday, this newspaper reported how trouble is brewing for the Clerk to Parliament after it emerged that his office may have fraudulently altered the record of a House resolution to help the troubled Atiak Sugar Factory receive Shs108 billion cash injection from the government.

The Ministry of Finance had in November 2021 presented a broad supplementary budget request for more than Shs4 trillion to run the government.

 Embedded within the figures was Shs108 billion to buy equipment for the mechanisation of Atiak Sugar’s operations.

The House Budget Committee objected to the request but recommended that the money be spent on equity shares for the government in the sugar company, which MPs adopted.

However, the MPs accused Mr Henry Yoweri Waiswa, the deputy clerk in charge of corporate affairs, of writing to the Finance Ministry indicating that Parliament had approved money to buy equipment.

About the factory

Atiak Sugar Factory at Gem Village in Pachilo Parish in Atiak Sub-county in Amuru District is jointly owned by the government of Uganda and Horyal Investment Holdings Company Ltd. The latter belongs to businesswoman Amina Hersi.

The factory—located 17km nor th of Atiak off the Gulu-Nimule road in Gem Village, Pachilo Parish, Atiak Sub-county in Amuru District—is the first major investment in the region.

 The project is being implemented under a public-private-community partnership between Naads, participating farmer cooperatives, and respective local governments of Amuru, Lamwo, and Horyal Investment Holdings Ltd.

Under the partnership, the community under Atiak Outgrowers and Gem-pachilo cooperative societies are to plant cane on the land and weed the plantations.

Once the cane is ready, the plantation—apportioned to the outgrowers by Naads—would be harvested and sold to the factory.