MPs fault banks inquiry report over failure to name individuals

Parliament. Members of Parliament have questioned why a report by a parliamentary committee that investigated the closure of banks failed to clearly pinpoint Bank of Uganda (BoU) officials that masterminded the irregular closure of seven commercial banks.

On day one of debate that will be concluded with specific recommendations today, MPs across the political divide asked why the Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises(Cosase) made “generalised”, ”shy” and “sugar-coated” recommendations without pinpointing culpable individuals for sanctions.

The MPs pointed out Mr Benedict Ssekabira, BoU’s director for Financial Markets Development Coordination (FMDC), Ms Justine Bagyenda, the former executive director for banks supervision and Ms Margaret Kasule, BoU’s legal counsel as some of the officials who were actively involved in the closure of banks and wondered why the trio was not pointed out for sanction.

National Bank of Commerce (NBC) shareholders told the Committee that Ms Bagyenda closed their bank even after they had raised the Shs7b the central bank had set as the requirement for capitalisation while Mr Sudhir Ruparelia indicated that she forced them to buy the bank.

Though the names of the trio were variously mentioned by different shareholders of the closed banks during the investigations, the Committee opted not to recommend specific sanctions against them, leaving some MPs questioning the process.

Last evening, MPs used tough adjectives to describe the officials at the central bank with the Buvuma Woman MP Janepher Nantume Egunyu saying there is a “syndicate of mafias” at the BoU Kampala Woman MP Nabilah Naggayi said they acted with “dishonesty, double-dealing and deceit” while Lugazi Municipality MP Isaac Mulindwa Ssozi warned of a “cancer” at the central bank.

Ms Sarah Opendi, the State Minister for Health (General Duties), demanded that the report by the Committee be referred to the Inspectorate of Government (IGG) for further investigations that can guide Parliament to take action. “We cannot sit here as a Parliament and adopt this report without bringing in personalities. If it was in developed countries, people should have resigned,” Ms Opendi said.

Lutseshe County MP Watenga Nabutanyi warned that “something may have gone wrong between the committee meetings and the writing of the report.” “In the meetings, they were harsh pointing fingers at individuals but in the report, they are shy. We need to find out what happened between the meetings and the writing of the report,” Mr Watenga said.

Responding to why the report did not give specifics of officials to sanction over the irregular closures of banks, out-going Cosase chairman Abdu Katuntu said the committee was constrained to name individuals partly because the central bank did not record any minutes from decisions that guided the closure of banks.

Mr Katuntu also talked of the “difficult circumstances” that the Committee worked under during the tail end of the inquiries when Kawempe South MP Mubarak Munyagwa was appointed to take over the committee leadership, sending the investigations into disarray.
President Museveni, Mr Katuntu revealed, also wrote objecting to the idea of any investigation into BoU.

COSASE TAKE
Mr Katuntu said the report writing was constrained by time as they were in a race against a tight deadline to table the report and hand over the committee.
“Will thus process pass the legal test? That is what informed our decision. The debate we are having today [yesterday], we had that very debate on whether we should have names or not. We reviewed thousands of documents and had only four days to review them and write a report,” Mr Katuntu said. Parliament will today make recommendations on the report

[email protected]