Parliament’s oil cash probe committee expressed displeasure with submissions made by the head of public service John Mitala describing it as ‘not useful.’
Mitala was appearing before the committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (Cosase) currently investigating the Shs 6 billion reward to 42 government officials for their role in a tax arbitration case between the government of Uganda and Heritage Oil and Gas.
While appearing before the committee, Mitala who also doubles as the secretary to cabinet told the committee that the reward was informally discussed by cabinet after the former attorney general Fred Ruhindi alluded to it.
However, when asked for the meeting minutes showing the discussion, Mitala told the committee chaired by Bugweri county MP Abdu Katuntu that there are no such records since he did not consider it as a substantial issue.
Mitala’s submission did not go well with committee members, with Katuntu questioning whether cabinet minutes are taken selectively and/or the payment was not important to cabinet.
“The only reason why we invited you as secretary to cabinet, is because you keep the cabinet records. But our disappointment – which are am sure you’re seeing from the questions being raised by members is that this very important matter, you’re the secretary and you say there’s no record about it. That is our biggest disappointment Mr Mitala and we want you to leave this room when you are aware. If the situation was as you are telling us then there is no reason as to why we should have even invited you” Katuntu said.
Mitala responded saying that cabinet minutes are not recorded verbatim indicating that on the particular day, there was no formal paper presented by Ruhindi about the reward.
“[Normally] the issue is brought to cabinet through a formal paper. I said during the discussion of this paper some of those issues came out. One would say but if am presenting, assuming I was the attorney general saying this case has been complicated we did ABCD and other members contributed, yeah it is difficult [to record] but the issue was not recorded. I was out of the discussions…” Mitala said.
At this point, Katuntu put it to Mitala that his committee was disappointed that such an important issue had been raised to cabinet and there is no record of it.
“Mr Mitala if you had come with the cabinet minutes and so on, you would have spent only five minutes in this meeting. Now you have spent almost close to an hour because you are the custodian of cabinet records and there are not there. So, I don’t think you have been as useful as we thought and on that note we thank you very much for coming and we shall invite you next time if we need you” Katuntu said.
Mitala however said that the decision is for the committee to conclude whether he was useless, insisting that if cabinet had made a conclusive decision on the amount to be rewarded and other details, he would have recorded the minutes.
“But Mr Chairman if cabinet had decided like earlier on you alluded to and even agreed on the amount of money, that would have been a serious matter to be recorded but these debates that go on and on in practice we don’t do that. Maybe that will happen when you do recommendations; you may recommend that cabinet also records like you do. Record the meetings verbatim.”
Mitala also told the committee that he was not party to any meetings outside cabinet that discussed the reward to the 42 government officials and cannot tell whether the public service standing orders were followed.
He told the committee that the standing orders require a public servant or group of public servants who think they have done extra-ordinary work to write to their permanent secretary justifying a need for a honorarium.
Mitala said that at this point, the permanent secretary makes a decision or further consultations in line with the request.
He confirmed to the committee that basing on what has come out since he did not attend meetings regarding the reward, the Shs 6 billion payment was not under the Public Service Standing Orders but that since the president is a fountain of honour, he can give anything.