Dr Isaac Mutenyo, the project coordinator of Uganda Support to Municipal Infrastructure Development (Usmid) and John William Ediu, the project procurement officer, spent about seven hours in detention at Parliament.
The two officials drew the ire of MPs on the Local Government Accounts committee for allegedly misappropriating $160m (Shs 579bn) meant for infrastructure development in 14 municipalities.
The latest auditor general’s report found irregularities ranging from exaggerated costs; delayed implementation of works, shoddy works and roads shorter in length and width contrary to the contract.
The MPs called for an investigation into the loan funds and the project managers. The committee chaired by Aswa MP Reagan Okumu started digging into the misuse of the loan funds on Monday.
The loan component comprised of $150m (Shs 510b) from the World Bank and $10m (Shs 34bn) in counterpart funding from the government of Uganda for infrastructure development in municipalities under the Usmid programme.
The loan was also supposed to enhance institutional capacity of selected municipalities to address urban service delivery gaps in the financial year 2013/14. Usmid projects include mainly road maintenance, installation of solar lights, garbage collection and construction of latrines for public schools and town dwellers.
The auditor general’s report details a lot of anomalies in road construction, raising the possibility of government losing huge sums of money.
Angered by the blatant fraud, the MPs asked Dr Mutenyo and John William Ediu to record statements with the parliamentary Criminal Investigations and Intelligence directorate, CIID.
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