We never lost cash in road contracts - Unra

The Uganda National Roads Authority (Unra) yesterday reiterated that it had “adequately” answered queries related to road works raised by auditors from Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets (PPDA).

In an exclusive yesterday, this publication yesterday reported about what the auditors called “irregularities” and “unsatisfactory” procurement performance by the roads agency in the 2018/2019 and 2019/2020 fiscal years.

The July 2021 report, which Unra said was a “draft” pending an exit meeting to reconcile its answers with the audit queries, catalogued cases of alleged loss of several billions of shillings due to what the auditors characterised as delayed payments, interest disbursement preceding works and contract price variations.

In a rejoinder yesterday, the roads agency described as “inaccurate” our reporting based on the audit queries that were addressed a year or so ago. 

“…the public audit procedures require that an exit meeting is held after the responses. Unra awaits to be invited to an exit meeting with PPDA after which an audit report, which takes account of all additional informational availed, will be issued,” Unra noted in its statement.

The agency contends that the alleged outstanding queries would have been resolved one way or another, and a final audit report for the reviewed financial years released, had PPDA convened the expected exit meeting.
In its statement issued yesterday, Unra noted that “whereas the issues raised by the procurement auditors in the draft report were addressed, we reiterate that there is no such loss of funds”.

It remains unclear why PPDA, which admits that its investigations are still ongoing, has already published on its website the impugned audit report.

The report was by last evening still up on the website of PPDA which the government established in 2003 to superintend public procurement and asset disposal, ensuring integrity of the process and value-for-money for the contracts.

Titled, procurement and disposal audit report for Financial Year 2019/2020 – Uganda National Roads Authority, the audit details the contracted road works, expected and actual engineering works, contract price and type in the reviewed period. 

The auditors noted that Unra failed to fully implement previous audit recommendations with 100 percent of both the previous compliance and performance recommendations being partially implemented, hence affecting performance.

They added that Unra officials poorly estimated procurement costs, leading to significant variances between prices in signed contracts and planned or estimated amounts in seven procurements worth Shs573b.

According to the report, there was issuance of inadequate solicitation documents to bidders in nine procurements, worth Shs654b, resulting in Shs583m loss.

It accuses Unra of using direct procurement methods without adequate justification, and the auditors reported that three procurements worth Shs11b were riddled with irregularities, leading to Shs158m loss out of “negligence”. 

But in yesterday’s rejoinder, the roads agency noted that “we would like to clarify that, Unra exhaustively responded to all findings and queries raised in that draft report in a submission made to PPDA on July 22, 2021”.

“… Unra has since had a minimum of three statutory financial and technical audits and it would be misleading … to give the impression that institutions like the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) missed such gross negligence and financial loss within the organisation,” the statement signed as issued by management read in part.

We yesterday asked PPDA whether it had received the Unra responses, and if so, whether they satisfactorily answered the audit queries, and why they have not help the exit meeting as expected. 

Mr Benson Turamye, the PPDA executive director, said he had not personally seen the Unra responses and will confirm the submission with his auditors today.   “What you wrote (our lead in yesterday’s edition) is true, but the audit is still ongoing. It becomes complete when we issue the final report,” he said.

The PPDA head did not explain why they have then uploaded a partial report on their website before conclusion of the audit process.