Police investigates Health ministry over Shs600m

The Ministry of Health Permanent Secretary, Dr Asuman Lukwago, and several senior officials of the ministry are under police investigation over alleged mismanagement of Shs638 million received from Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for various health projects.

Police investigations followed findings of an audit by the American Embassy into billions of shilling the US government committed to the ministry for HIV/Aids and TB programmes.

The money was released to the ministry between 2009 and 2013 through a partnership with CDC.

The Criminal Investigations and Intelligence Directorate (CIID), has already opened case files against the suspects.

The CIID director, Ms Grace Akullo, confirmed the investigations but was reluctant to divulge more information about the cases.

“We are investigating a number of projects carried out under the Ministry of Health and CDC partnership. Some people have so far recorded statements and were released on police bond,” Ms Akullo told Saturday Monitor.

Sources privy to the ongoing investigations say the discrepancies in accountability were brought to the attention of the police by an official from the American Embassy.

The files being investigated are from different projects on HIV/Aids.

PIMA machine rollout project
In this project, there was double requisitioning of funds by the ministry’s officials for training health officials across the country although CDC’s Baylor was handling the project. The government procured 250 machines to be distributed at different health care centres.

In April 2012, the Director General of Health Services, Ms Ruth Aceng, wrote to CDC seeking support in training health officials on the use of the Point of Care Machines (PIMA machines for HIV testing).

According to police information, Dr Lukwago signed a memorandum of understanding with CDC but also appended a signature authorising the ministry to release more than Shs63m for the same activity.

Detectives have visited various health facilities to ascertain whether such training sessions took place but the health workers said they only saw officials of Baylor and other organisations attached to CDC. This raised a serious query of accountability.

Attempts to speak to Dr Lukwago were futile as his known phone number was switched off.

TB/HIV mentorship programme
The Ministry of Health and CDC agreed on a work plan for 2011/2012 financial year and the TB/HIV mentorship programme was part of the arrangement.

A sum of $19,114 (about Shs49m) was allocated for the programme and the ministry approved expenditure of the money.

Mr Eric Kooma, the programme manager for TB/HIV project, who was recently released on police bond, requisitioned Shs41.7 million which was paid to personal accounts of seven ministry officials, including the secretary to Dr Lukwago, Ms Mildred Bahemuka.

At least Shs38.5m was sent to Mr Kooma’s account.

A source told Saturday Monitor that Ms Bahemuka refunded the Shs850,000 sent to her account as soon as police began investigations, saying the money had not been used.

In a statement to police, Mr Kooma says the money was still on his account but bank records in police possession state otherwise.
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Other projects and queries
Many other programmes and projects are being investigated by police for alleged abuse of the funds meant for the assigned activities. Police have discovered cases of double requisition of funds from the CDC and the ministry for same activities.

Other people out on police bond include Dr Zainabu Akol, who was then the programme manager CDC, now heading reproductive health in the ministry and Mr Suleiman Ikoba, an administrator.

The two are reported to have received more than Shs500 million on various dates between 2009 and 2010 but failed to account for the money.Another file under investigation involves Shs27m sent to Mr Ikoba’s account in June 2013 allegedly to facilitate 10 Members of Parliament to travel to northern Uganda for a meeting on mother- to-child HIV prevention.

A report produced by the African Centre for Global Health and Social Transformation at the request of the Ministry of Health in 2013 found that the failure to manage funding from global initiatives led to the collapse of the health system.

The initiatives whose funds were found to have been abused included UNAids, the UN programme on HIV/Aids, Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (Gavi), Global Stop Tuberculosis Partnership and the Global Fund to fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

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