Power, money wars rock key Uganda embassies

Dogfights, especially over control of finances and supremacy are raging at 17 Ugandan embassies abroad, fracturing work relations and lowering morale among staff amid what sources call “unprecedented incompetence” by the supervisors in Kampala.

The turf wars, according to multiple diplomatic sources in Kampala and abroad, are “merely a continuation” as a result of President Museveni’s continued appointment of loyal cadres and election losers as his representatives abroad—ambassadors—which has been an issue of concern and debate for years.

While the appointment of ambassadors is technically the prerogative of the President, oftentimes, according to sources, there is little input from the Foreign Affairs ministry or their recommendations are ignored. Currently, there is only one career ambassador, who has grown through the ranks and is the Head of Mission—Isaac Ssebulime in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Uganda has 38 embassies abroad. Add to the mix, the rampant nepotism and cronyism in appointment and posting of lower rank Foreign Service officers to the embassies, and the perennial inadequate funding that has constipated work plans.

In Algeria, after several months of tight rope pulling, Ambassador Alintuma Nsambu wrote to the Finance and Foreign Affairs ministries in Kampala last December seeking the withdrawal of the finance attaché over nine grounds.

Ambassador Nsambu, a former lawmaker for Bukoto County East, accused Mr Mohammed Kirunda of, among others, disrespect, hardly being at the station since posting in July 2022, disrespecting banking regulations in the host country, and engaging in political mobilisation on behalf of the Opposition.

“The purpose of this letter is to ask you, sir, to kindly send us another professional accountant who knows what it means to be a diplomat and who respects the Head of Mission and cultural values of this country. I cannot continue working with him because of his incomprehensible conduct and unprofessionalism,” Ambassador Nsambu beseeched the Finance ministry Permanent Secretary, Mr Ramathan Ggoobi.

The Ministry of Finance assigns finance attaches to embassies to oversee financial matters and accountability. The financial attaches, according to the Bank Account Management guidelines issued by the Accountant General in 2016, also act as one of the co-signatories to the embassies’ accounts.

Ambassador Nsambu first nitpicked Mr Kirunda, who has been on the job for only six months, on the closed WhatsApp group for ambassadors prior to writing to Kampala last December 10.

The crux of the matter however, according to correspondences and chats, is Mr Kirunda protesting Ambassador Nsambu’s decision to move from a residential home of a monthly rent of Algerian Dinar (DZD) 1.2 million (about Shs31 million) to one of DZD2 million (about Shs53 million). The movement, according to embassy records, cost the embassy DZD800,000 (Shs21 million).

By the end of the FY 2022/2023 the Algiers Mission will have spent more than $84,000 (Shs306 million) on the ambassador’s rent, monies squeezed from other budgeted activities.

READ: Govt freezes accounts of embassy in Algeria

Yet during the budget planning the embassy budgeted for Shs1.3 billion as rent for all staff, only for the ambassador to move into the new house in July 2022 in the new financial year. This meant the other embassy had to look around their expenditures to top up their rent.

Dogfights

“The attaché has been at the station for only six months. How did he commit all those crimes?” one diplomat at the ministry in Kampala wondered.

“The number of complaints received from the embassies are alarming. But our head prefect (PS) is to say the least ineffectual. Even before hearing from the accused a decision is taken,” the diplomat noted.

Some complaints from the embassies detailing accusations of financial impropriety have spiralled to the Inspectorate of Government.

Ordinarily, when a raft of accusations are made against a staff at the embassy, the Foreign Affairs ministry is supposed to dispatch an inspection mission to inquire into the matter on the ground.

Diplomatic sources told Daily Monitor the Permanent Secretary Vincent Bagiire “shoots and aims later.”

Sources at the ministry also noted a growing trend of some ambassadors levelling “political accusations” to attract immediate attention.

Weaponising NUP

At Uganda’s High Commission in London, sources indicated, a turf war is raging between the High Commissioner Nimisha Madhvani and her deputy Leonard Mugerwa, who she accuses and has reported in Kampala as a National Unity Platform (NUP) “sympathiser.”

Ambassador Mugerwa joined the Foreign Affairs ministry in 1992, starting out in the Department of Africa and Middle East.

Retired Ambassador Harold Acemah, a former deputy head of Uganda’s diplomatic mission in Brussels, told Daily Monitor that to accuse Mr Mugerwa of such is “at best ridiculous.”

“Outrightly, the problem is Ambassador Madhvani. Everywhere she goes there is scandal,” Ambassador Acemah said.

Prior to her posting in London in December 2021, Ambassador Madhvani was Head of Mission at Uganda’s embassy in Copenhagen, Denmark. In August 2020, she and her then deputy made headlines after they were alleged to have participated in a zoom meeting to plot how quickly to expend unused funds.

One senior official at the embassy in Kampala said to accuse “a career diplomat of engaging in political party politicking is really far from the truth.”

“But of course that is the next level of a smear campaign gaining traction. Politics is such a sensitive matter, and NUP is for that matter an incendiary subject; so it is easy to exploit,” the official said.

Meanwhile, on another front Ambassador Madhvani is butting heads with the Mission’s accounting officer over finances. Upon arrival in London the ambassador rejected the official residence on grounds that it was in disrepair and found her own residence. This means the accounting officer has to factor in the unplanned rent which affects budgeted activities.

“Just know it is another toxic environment,” a source in London intimated.

Such endless fights between ambassadors and their subordinates fracture work relations among staff, promote unprincipled rivalry and lower morale at the missions and embarrass the country. With the embassy staff spending a lot of time fighting, concerns abound of how they can execute their mandate of advancing the country’s interests abroad.

Uganda’s missions abroad serve three main purposes: economic/commercial, consular services and political cooperation. Some serve only one, two or all the three, owing to their mission charters, location, size, and budgets.

Toxic in DC

A December 2018 report of the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee on the Auditor General’s findings for four financial years between 2013 and 2017, accused political appointees of intrigue, arrogance, and in some cases outright incompetence in executing their diplomatic duties. The report also cites problems of micro-management, and low morale among lower embassy staff.

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The problems, multiple sources talked to said, are compounded by the fact that political appointees installed as ambassadors “unnecessarily” feel undermined by their underlings.

The dogfights, according to sources, are “worse” at Uganda’s embassy in Washington DC headed by Ambassador Robie Kakonge whom the President assigned in December 2021, replacing Ambassador Mull Katende. She is the daughter of the former Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) stalwart, John Kakonge.

The fights in DC, which started as about control of procurements and finances, ultimately culminated in the removal of co-signers on the embassy accounts in CitiBank. The quick removal of the signatories meant the embassy failed to pay salaries for two months now and settling of other expenditures amounting to Shs330 million. This as CitiBank is threatening to freeze the embassy accounts.

Both the Foreign Affairs ministry Permanent Secretary, Mr Bagiire, and Ambassador Kakonge did not respond to our inquiries on the matter.

The fractured working relations, one cabinet minister who accompanied President Museveni to DC in mid-last December for the second US-Africa summit, told this newspaper, “was on full display throughout.”

“The ambassador even reported her staff to the President,” one diplomat, who was part of the President’s entourage, narrated.

Grave accusations

The scheme was reportedly orchestrated by a section of the staff under her predecessor, Ambassador Katende. Consequently, Ms Kakonge wrote to Mr Ggoobi and Mr Bagiire seeking to change the co-signatories to the account.

Ambassador Katende told Daily Monitor at the weekend he needed time to first crosscheck the details of the allegations.

The threatened freezing of the embassy’s bank accounts, according to multiple correspondences, started with “fabricated reports” sent to Kampala of a “long running fraud scheme” that cost the embassy $93,000 (Shs357.7 million).

The 2016 bank management guidelines provide for two co-signatories—a finance attaché and accounting officer, a diplomat at the embassy. The two officers must sign to effect any transaction. Where there is no financial attaché, the accounting officer designates a second co-signatory.

The DC embassy account had three signatories, according to Finance ministry records, one of whom returned to Kampala upon completion of his tour of duty. Ambassador Kakonge, however, had a bad working relationship with the other two.

Owing to endless squabbles, Mr Bagiire and Mr Ggoobi succumbed to pressure and hastily withdrew the finance attaché before investigations into the matter. Mr Bagiire wrote to the attaché on January 24, 2023 reassigning her to the newly opened embassy in Doha, Qatar.

‘A laughable mess’

Sources in Kampala indicated that what was reported to authorities in Kampala as a fraud scheme was actually not. Rather, CitiBank executives in DC had written to the embassy seeking clarification on a series of transactions between October 2021 and August 2022, including crossing the usual threshold.

The $93,000 (about Shs357.7 million) was transacted from August 2021 to August 2022. The money included the monthly Embassy imprest as well as salaries to three temporary staff hired to fill the gap after three essential staff had resigned.

Ambassador Katende, then as ambassador, had conferred with the rest of the staff on the emergency temporary recruitment as a formal process was effected to permanently fill the positions. Two of the three temporary staff hired were related to the financial attaché, whom Mr Bagiire has now transferred, and they were living at her residence. The said staff were paid through cashed cheques.

While the embassy is still engaged in back and forth with Citi Bank over the payments—deemed suspect because of the blood relations to the staff, sources say the inability to effect payments was triggered after Ambassador Kakonge requested the removal of the accounting officer, Ms Margaret Kafeero, who alongside the financial attaché, Ms Janet Gimbo Kirya, were the remaining two co-signatories.

PS Bagiire complied with her request and in a January 4 letter, PS Goobi appointed the deputy Ambassador Santa Laker as the new accounting officer. Effective immediately, the swift change of accounting officer and financial attaché at the same time became a major problem.

Ordinarily, the government changes co-signatories—both the accounting officer and finance attaché in this case—at the end of the financial year when all transactions have been frozen. Ms Kakonge pushed for the changes six months into the current financial year.

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Ambassador Kakonge then proceeded to unilaterally select interim nominations of signatories, contrary to the Accountant General’s Bank Account Management guidelines. Due to the ongoing fractured relations and mistrust of intentions, the remaining staff declined to be nominated.

“The impression created here when we first received the complaint is far different from the true picture on the ground,” a senior official in Kampala said about the matter. “Now they are in a real laughable mess.”

Manoeuvrings galore

Ordinarily, when a raft of accusations are made against staff at embassies, the Foreign Affairs ministry customarily dispatches an inspection mission to inquire into the matters on the ground. This is done to ensure that due-process is fulfilled under public service disciplinary procedures and to avoid finger pointing over simple administrative issues “and killing mosquitoes with hammers,” quipped another official.

The official hinted on ongoing manoeuvrings at the ministry’s headquarters to recall all the other staff—about 10—from the deputy ambassador, Ms Laker. This obstacle so far is that such a majority recall—repatriating staff and their families—would cost north of Shs350 million.  The cost of transporting their replacements would be in the range of $30,000 (Shs109 million) per person.

The implications

When replicated—recalling junior staff squabbling with their political appointed superior—across board, the already cash-strapped embassies would be strangled financially.

Ambassador Acemah said all missions have accounting officers appointed by and answerable to the PS/Secretary to the Treasury, not PS/Foreign Affairs.

“The accounting officers are in most cases career diplomats. Hence the conflict and row with ambassadors who are predominantly political appointees and cadres of NRM,” he said. “Ambassadors have no legitimate role to play in managing embassy funds.”

He added: “The PS/Secretary to the Treasury should remind them of the fact they are not accounting officers and should not dip their fingers in Mission funds. In the discharge of their duties accounting officers are guided by regulations issued by Ministry of Finance, not Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The brewing crisis is an old story. It’s old wine in new bottles. What Ugandan Ambassadors are trying to do is unprofessional, unethical, indefensible and unacceptable!”

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