Uganda Airlines chief executive officer Jenifer Bamuturaki appears before the Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises at Parliament yesterday. PHOTO/DAVID LUBOWA
|Uganda airlines lost Shs960m in freebies
What you need to know:
- This resulted from free flight tickets issued by the airlines to unknown persons.
At least Shs964.2m ($253,189) was lost through free flight tickets last November after 908 persons travelled for free, especially to Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The information came to light as additional evidence to support reports that had been leaked to lawmakers on Parliament’s Committee on Commissions Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (Cosase) continued to be put under the microscope.
On Wednesday, as the committee probed the Uganda Airlines team over glitches spotlighted in the Auditor General report for Financial Year 2020/2021, lawmakers demanded that the airlines produce the list of 200 persons and any other extra parties that received concessions to travel last November.
Up to Shs964.2m ($253,189) was lost through the free flight tickets to unknown persons. Mr Paul Turacayisenga, the director in charge of finance at Uganda Airlines, conceded that the lost revenue may never be recovered.
“In our case, things to do with revenue protection are highly [sensitive] and require immediate alerts to the highest level. When this came to my attention, I wrote to the CEO (Ms Jenifer Bamuturaki) and informed her about it. I have an email,” Mr Turacayisenga said, adding “There is some worry [because] there is likelihood that some money may not be recovered.”
While she didn’t share granular details on beneficiaries of the free flight tickets, Mr Turacayisenga told the lawmakers that Uganda’s flag carrier has since instituted an internal audit to exhaustively deal with the issue.
The lawmakers also learnt of a contract signed between Ms Bamuturaki and bloggers under the banner of ‘Independent Online Journalists’ (Indoja-U) to “clean up” negative publicity on Uganda Airlines. The job was to be done at a monthly rate of Shs13m across 12 months.
Mr Joel Ssenyonyi, the Cosase chairperson, indicated that the contract formalised on December 24, 2021, was only signed between Ms Bamuturaki and Mr Andrew Irumba, a representative of Indoja-U. Ms Monica Kobusinge was a witness.
The contract is reported to be littered with irregularities. For instance, Mr Bisereko Kyomuhendo—Uganda Airlines’ company Secretary—never signed off. Mr Kyomuhendo yesterday denied knowledge of the contract although his name appears on the said contract.
Additionally, after the contract was signed, Shs117m was drawn out of Uganda Airlines’ coffers to pay Indoja-U for work done back in April of 2021.
Whereas Ms Bamuturaki said she knew the contract leaked to the committee, she declined to respond to queries raised by the lawmakers.
“They came at a time when we were having a lot of negative publicity, so they sent us a document on how they could work with us,” Ms Bamuturaki said, adding, “I will write something [about it] and send it to you.”
The red-flagged bloggers were said to be under the direct supervision of the acting director of commercial services at the airlines, Ms Regina Tebasiima.
Ms Tebasiima indicated that she periodically filed reports about the performance of the bloggers to Ms Bamuturaki. This contravenes the default expectation where such an arrangement would require the bloggers to report to the corporate affairs and public relations manager at the airlines, Ms Shakila Lamar.
Ms Tebasiima declined to furnish evidence of the aforementioned communication between herself and Ms Bamuuraki. This led Mr Ssenyonyi to instruct parliament’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) police unit to compel her to produce the required information.
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