Makerere University Vice Chancellor Prof John Ddumba-Ssentamu has denied approving Shs 300 million for an investigation into alleged alteration of marks and awarding fake degrees two years ago.
Earlier this week, social media circulated letters issued by Prof Ddumba asking the University Secretary to process payment of Shs 300 million, and again, authorising part-payment of Shs 80 million to the committee set to investigate the scam.
In the January 16 letter, Prof. Ddumba sought for payment of the money having been requested by the University Secretary Charles Barugahare to confirm the amount for the exercise.
According to the documents seen, Barugahare became reluctant to release the money since it was not budgeted for but the vice chancellor insisted that the money be released. The University Secretary released the money on January 31 after the bursar Augustine Tamale consented to the request.
According to a voucher seen by URN, Shs 80 million was advanced to Dr Damalie Musoke Naggita, the Principal of School of Law to begin the work. But in an interview with URN, Ddumba denied the university’s approval. He further adds that paying Shs 80 million to an individual’s account was mistakenly done and that the money was sent back to university accounts.
“The truth of the matter is that the Shs 80 million is not an allowance. It is to facilitate including adverts and other things and other logistics like gadgets that are going to used to interview these people. I mean, the work is too much by the way. And am saying these that nobody has approved Shs 300m. Those are just lies, that was their proposal.
The Office of the Vice Chancellor has not decided that we are going to pay Shs 300 million. That money has not been approved by anybody. Those [suggesting] are people who are just negative about the university because I heard people saying that the VC was giving a ‘handshake’ to people. Oh my goodness! There is no handshake”, Ddumba said.
URN could not independently ascertain whether money was sent back. Prof Ddumba told URN that the money advanced to Dr Naggita was to cater for adverts and other logistical issues including small allowances.
“These are investigations; these are change of marks we are talking about. These are meetings. We had a committee two years. A committee was set up not by the Vice Chancellor Ddumba; not by management but it was set up by Senate to look into these allegations of change of marks. There is this so-called allowance to staff. Allowance to staff, how much is it? To have this [committee] the whole day from 9am to 5pm, you need some compensation. How much is the compensation, Shs 200,000, Shs 300,000? What is Shs 300,000 to somebody who has been there the whole day?”, Ddumba added.
According to the vouchers, each member of the committee is receive Shs 300,000 as sitting allowance on every sitting which will amount to Shs 266 million for the over 40 hearings.
The University Council members who come from outside the university receive a net allowance of Shs 300,000 per sitting while insiders including staff and students who sit on council receive Shs 165,000. Senate committees receive between Shs 50,000 and Shs 80,000.
This payment however did not go down well with members of Makerere University Academic Staff Association (Muasa), an association body for lecturers who say the university lacks prioritisation.
Muasa insists that the vice chancellor is ‘exposing’ himself as he justifies the amount of money to be received as allowances by the committee. Deus Kamunyu Muhwezi, the Muasa publicist says that the university has had committees in the past over similar cases and no action taken.
“But if you are saying that you are financially constrained and the staff at the university are suffering, we could use other centres, the organs of our university to dispose some of these key issues within the framework of our spending. To me it would be the wise path such that we are not seen to spend way above what we have budgeted to spend in a year. So setting up committees like this to further siphon yet in the past committees have found out some things and inaction has been the order of the day. It is very unacceptable”, Muhwezi.
Kamunyu is concerned that the money released is not on the university budget for this financial year and that this is how the university has been losing money.
“In the same letters I also read that someone was asking where they should charge this money. Because it seemed not to be on the budget,” Kamunyu said.
Kamunyu wondered how many retirees would be paid out of the Shs 300 million for their unpaid retirement benefits. He said the university must think about the implications of their decisions in terms of finances.
“If our systems really worked, how many retirees would be given out of this package [of the] Shs 300 million. There are people here who have not been paid for five years. They are running around [for] 10 years. Don’t you think these were our members who served this institution with merit, with accolades? Do we have to really forget them? I sit on committees and many of my colleagues sit on committees to deliberate on the same issues but we sometimes go even without a cup of tea. Sometimes think deeply about the financial implications of our decisions” Kamunyu said.
The committee will spend Shs 6 million on preparatory meetings of members, Shs 266 million as allowances for committee members, Shs 4 million for report production, Shs 100,000 as bank charges, Shs 8.9 million on airtime and a newspaper advert, Shs 500,000 for stationery and the rest of the money to be used for meeting refreshments including breakfast, lunch and water.
In 2015, shortly after its 65th graduation ceremonies, reports emerged in the media that Makerere University had graduated up to 600 students without fulfilling the requirements for the award of degrees of the university.
Prof Ddumba Ssentamu refuted the allegations, saying the university had not awarded any fake degrees, graduated any undeserving candidates or recalled any degrees.
“We treat these reports as unfounded allegations only aimed at tarnishing the image of this great institution. We in management would like to re-affirm that Makerere University was not involved in any degree scandal, has not recalled any degrees and has not issued fake degrees,” said Prof Ddumba.
Internally, however, a committee was set up to investigate the allegations.