Ghosts of Education ministry back to haunt former PS

Dr Nassali-Lukwago was charged with fraud over payment of Shs33.8m to a consulting firm that dealt with recruiting staff in the ministry

Allegation of massive corruption, abuse of office, fictitious procurements and embezzlement of public resources have been thrown at the Education Ministry for years. There have also been dog fights for power in the ministry, fuelled by what insiders see as egos and intrigue.
Dr Rose Nassali-Lukwago, the immediate former permanent secretary of the Education ministry, is currently on the spot. She and three others were on Thursday charged with fraud in the Anti-Corruption Court over an incident that happened years ago.
The allegations that have bedevilled the ministry for years, some of which were brought back to life on Thursday, border on officials employing ghost staff, abusing office, stealing government property, inflating school enrolment, receiving allowances for no work done, bribing and colluding with auditors to circumvent queries, irregular recruitment and nepotism, among other things.
Dr Nassali-Lukwago was charged with fraud over payment of Shs33.8m to a consulting firm that dealt with recruiting staff in the ministry. Others jointly charged with her are Dr Opio Okiror, a former assistant commissioner for human resource in the Education ministry, Cuthbert Kagabo, a former deputy director of AH Consulting Limited, and Mr Jaffer Kawooya, who was by the time of the commission of the alleged crime was an internal auditor in the Ministry of Public Service. Mr Kawooya was not in court to be charged and criminal summons were issued against him.
Dr Nassali-Lukwago is the Secretary to the Judicial Service Commission, Dr Okiror is the current commissioner for Human Resource at the Judiciary, while Mr Kagabo is the managing director of Scales Solutions Limited.
To stem the rot that the President considered to be creeping through the ministry, he on October 1, 2018, directed that six senior officials in the Ministry of Education be relieved of their duties. The directive followed a series of scandals which this newspaper reported about at the time.
The President also directed that the Contracts Committee of the same ministry be “disbanded with immediate effect” in relation to the “mishandling of the process for procuring furniture for selected primary schools in Uganda under the Ministry of Education and Sports.”
The officials whose sacking the President ordered were Mr Daniel Nkaada, the ministry’s former commissioner for Basic Education; Mr Philly Mpaata, a quantity surveyor with Uganda Teacher and School Effectiveness Project (UTSEP); Mr William Hasoho, a procurement specialist at UTSEP; Mr Ambrose Ruyoka, a ministry official attached to the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) project; Mr Gillian Okello; and Mr Thaddeus Lugolobi, who the IGG had in 2017 ordered to refund Shs8.2m over the mismanagement of an emergency construction programme. Mr Nkaada had been ordered to refund Shs10,080,000 in the same scam.
The members of the ministry’s contracts committee, which Mr Museveni ordered to be disbanded, comprised Ismail Mulindwa, the commissioner in charge of private schools (chairperson), Mr Alfred Kyaka, an assistant commissioner in charge of secondary education, Mr Claudia Arwako, Mr Cuthbert Muyala, and Faith Nyamwenge from the Attorney General’s chambers.

How Nassali-Lukwago got into trouble
A decision taken around 2013 by the management at the Education ministry under long serving former PS Francis Xavier Lubanga, who was leaving the ministry at the time, morphed over time and culminated in the arrest of Dr Nassali-Lukwago and her co-accused.
At the time of Mr Lubanga’s departure, the ministry was “rolling over” from the Uganda Post-Primary Education & Training Expansion and Improvement (African Development Bank (ADB Education IV) to the Higher Education, Science and Technology (HEST) – ADB V Project. The ADBV was to oversee construction of facilities at different public universities.
The Lubanga leadership, according to Ministry of Education sources familiar with the happenings at the time, made a decision that the ADB V project would be run by a “formally constituted team.”
The Project Coordinating Unit (PCU) of ADB IV, which was headed by Mr Kyaaka, with Mr John Ongimu Omeke as technical advisor - engineering, had been picked by Mr Lubanga. It also had Mr Kenneth Amegu (financial specialist) and a one Mugerwa, working as a management and evaluation specialist.
With that background, the ministry under Dr Nassali, procured two consultants; PILA Consultants headed by Prof J.C. Munene and AH Consulting Limited, to recruit the staff for the staff for ADBV.
PILA Consultants were to undertake the recruitment of the technical staff, while AH Consulting Limited officials were given the mandate of recruiting the non-technical staff. In the report of PILA Consultants, none of the staff who had been on the ADBIV project coordinating unit was selected.
For example, an engineer of ADB IV who had applied and sat for interviews for the post of project coordinator, was rated as No.23 among the applicants in the PILA Consultants report.
As a result, a meeting was called at the Finance ministry by Mr Keith Muhakanizi, the Permanent Secretary/Secretary to the Treasury. It was attended by Dr Nassali, Dr Okiror, Mr Omeke, Mr Kyaaka and Ms Mariam Lawino, the technical advisor – architecture, among others. This was when Dr Nassali-Lukwago had just taken office in 2013.
The meeting quashed the PILA Consultants’ report. It was resolved that Dr Nassali-Lukwago re-appoints the old team that had worked on the ADB IV to take charge of the ADBV project. The Education ministry, under Dr Nassali-Lukwago, implemented the decisions.
The AH Consulting Limited report was, however, implemented and payments made to both consulting firms. Sources say this caused a nugatory expenditure, a disbursement that does not achieve any result. The payment was initiated by Dr Okiror and authorised by Dr Nassali-Lukwago, sources say.
The officers who were left out, especially the non-technical ones, complained to the IGG and investigations commenced.
A source at the IGG told Saturday Monitor that letters were drafted and sent to all the officials implicated in this particular scam early this year to refund the money lost. They did not respond. A decision was then taken to prosecute them.
The suspects appeared before Chief Magistrate Pamela Lamunu Ocaya on Thursday for taking plea and they denied the charges. Ms Ocaya granted each of them a cash bail of Shs3m.
They will appear in court again on September 10.

Dr Nassali-Lukwago takes no prisoners

Controversy. Dr Rose Nassali-Lukwago is no stranger to controversy. She is not one to shy away from a fight, not when she feels it is worth it.
Her contract as secretary to the Judicial Service Commission expired recently. She was posted there in late 2015 and while there, she has ruffled feathers. The most publicised fallout she was involved in as accounting officer of the body charged with appointing and disciplining judges was when she defied a directive to effect an increase in the pay for part-time commissioners until court directed so.
The part-time commissioners previously earned Shs4.5m per month, but had their pay hiked to Shs19.2m, which is Shs10m more than what full-time judges of the High Court earn and just shy of the Shs20m monthly pay for the Chief Justice.
Dr Nassali-Lukwago argued that part-time commissioners were not entitled to salary but allowances, arguing that only full-time employees earn salary. They most of the time are required to report to the commission only four times a month. The part-time commissioners in question were Ms Mary Nyakikongoro, Ms Christine Amongin Aporu, Ms Norah Matovu Winyi and Ms Ruth Sebatindira. Ms Aporu and Ms Nyakikongoro, two former MPs, filed a suit in the High Court over non-payment of their enhanced emoluments.
Their push for enhanced pay had been backed by Justice Minister Kahinda Otafiire, arguing that the pay hike had been cleared by Parliament. Dr Nassali-Lukwago would not have any of that, however. She held onto the money for almost a year, from July 2018 to May 2019 and only effected the pay, even clearing the outstanding arrears amounting to Shs529.2m, after the High Court had ruled in favour of the part-time commissioners.
Disquiet in Education
Before she was posted to the Education Service Commission, Dr Nassali-Lukwago had made a name while serving in the Ministry of Education, taking on and eventually vanquishing long-serving Education permanent secretary (PS) Francis Xavier Lubanga.
Her appointment as PS in the Ministry of Education in June 2013 was the culmination of a long-running fight with her deeply entrenched predecessor, Mr Lubanga, who was moved over to become Secretary to the Education Service Commission.
Dr Nassali-Lukwago had served as head of the Education Standards Agency (ESA) in the Education ministry, but was interdicted and later demoted, on the watch of Mr Lubanga, over alleged “condoning of crime and concealment of information from senior management, negligence of duty and insubordination”. That was in 2007.
“Insiders at the ministry trace the alleged bad blood between Mr Lubanga and Ms Nassali-Lukwago to the latter’s alleged refusal to recognise Mr Lubanga as her supervisor after she was appointed and instead opted to report directly to the minister,” Sunday Monitor reported on June 23, 2013.
There were also claims that she was too close to First Lady Janet Museveni, claims which she denied at the time, but which all the same alienated her from different players in the ministry.
The letter of her interdiction in 2007 was signed by President Museveni, but he would change his mind about her a year later, according to a testimony Dr Nassali-Lukwago gave in a church in Kamwokya, captured in The Observer newspaper of August 18, 2013.
“I was sacked by my boss [Lubanga],” The Observer quoted her as saying on August 15 at the Kamwokya Catholic Parish church.
The [paper further quoted her: “My differences with Lubanga were the cause of my problems. I was in charge of quality assurance [of] education in Uganda. But they sacked me without any notice. I had loans in the bank. I was grassing. But I asked God to help me through the situation … I had a lot of problems. I was wrongfully fired by my boss. I contemplated going to the IGG’s office. But, something told me that leave everything to God. Take it to God’s court.”
She then landed the ultimate punch: “Now, I’m seated in the chair of the man who sacked me. I even sign as permanent secretary. I have returned to the ministry in a much high job than the one I had when I was sacked.”
In explaining her woes in the Education ministry to this newspaper, Dr Nassali-Lukwago told Sunday Monitor of June 23, 2013: “Not only was I Interdicted but I was demoted in rank and pay. But I petitioned the President. They set up a committee of inquiry and they invited me to appear before it, however, the Education Service Commission never gave me feedback.”
The committee she referred to recommended that the punishment that had been handed down to Dr Nassali-Lukwago be “reviewed from demotion to severe reprimand”.
Lucky turn
One thing led to another, and Dr Nassali-Lukwago caught President Museveni’s eye once again.
She told The Observer: “He (Museveni) called me, and all the bosses at the ministry, and I had to explain myself before them. He (president) said I should be cross-examined in front of those who accused me so that I can explain myself. I explained myself, and they were tight-lipped.”
President Museveni seems to have made up his mind then. A series of meetings between him and Dr Nassali-Lukwago followed, until he ‘whispered’ to her his intention to make her PS.