Kampala – Anti- Corruption organisations in the country want the parliament to constitute systems that ensure all committees in parliament have powers to arrest each and every government official who confess of involving in corruption.
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The country director at Action Aid International Uganda, Xavier Ejoyi is wondering how the executive director of National bureau of standards, Mr. Living stone Ebiru would appear before COSASE in parliament, confess of bribing his members on the national standard council and freely left minus being arrested by the committee.
‘’ I think for me that is something we need to re-think, government institutions especially the inspectorate of the government should quickly move and apprehend these individuals and make sure by their own confessions prosecuted speedily’’ Ejoy note.
He added that the level of corruption accusations at the standard body could be the reason for continued struggling with poor quality products in the country and the latest being tonnes of Maize floor that were enrooted from Uganda to south Sudan and confined by south Sudan’s standard body over afro toxin related issues.
‘’The counter-accusations from the Executive director of UNBS and chairman board of the national standard council to me it was very low level that raises serious questions for us as the country’’ he said.
On his part, Marlon Agaba, the executive director at Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda-ACCU noted the members of National Standard Council at Uganda National bureau of standard must also go into forced leave to pave way for meaningful investigation about bribery scandal at the this standard body.
More About Ebiru
While appearing in the COSASE committee last week, Mr. Livingstone David Ebiru, the Managing director at UNBS confessed that he was forced by members on the board of National standard council to pay a bribe of Ugx 100m to secure his position in office, later the same person said that he was lying to the committee, he never paid any single coin inform of bribery this triggered minister for trade Francis Mwebesa to send him into faced leave of six months.
Ebiru’s suspension from office was contained in a letter dated 20 July 2023 addressed to him by the Minister with immediate effect to enable sufficient investigations into the alleged misappropriation of funds, misconduct, and abuse of office
“In light of the serious allegations against you, you are hereby directed to step aside for a period of six months with effect from 20 July 2023 to enable sufficient investigations into your misappropriation of funds, misconduct, and abuse of office”, the Minister’s letter partly read.
“By copy of this letter, the Chairperson of the Standards Council should ensure that a suitable caretaker of the office is identified and the matter is sufficiently investigated within the set timelines while following the law”
It emerged that Ebiru caused the transfer of funds in question from the Pre-Export Verification of Conformity (PVoC) suppliers account to a Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) account, a program under UNBS designated to receive donor funds.
During the probe, Charles Musekuura, the Chairperson of the UNBS Board revealed that out of the 17.964 billion Shillings in the GAIN account, Ebiru only authorized 5.499 billion Shillings) to be sent to the Consolidated Fund. The remaining 12.464 billion Shillings were converted and utilized as per Ebiru’s directives to support the operations of the Bureau.
