Ruparelia Group rubbishes reports of owning UMC Victoria Hospital

KAMPALA, UGANDA: Ruparelia Group of Companies, the conglomerate owned by Businessman Sudhir Ruparelia has dismissed reports linking them to UMC Victoria Hospital, saying the group has never been the owners nor affiliated to the hospital facility.

The hospital located at Bukoto, a Kampala Suburb has recently been at the centre of a row over internal body organ testing for Ugandans seeking to work abroad.

On May 27, 2022, Internal Affairs minister, Maj Gen (Rtd) Kahinda Otafiire, directed all labour export firms to take their clients to UMC Victoria hospital for body organ testing in a bid to minimize cases of the illegal internal tissue extraction in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

“All Ugandans travelling to GCC for employment will need to undergo a check for internal organs and trauma injuries before leaving Uganda as well as at arrival into Uganda. The ministry of Internal Affairs shall be setting up an authorized centre…at Bukoto, Kampala at the premises of the former Kadic hospital (operated by UMC Victoria hospital, which is a UN and ISO accredited organization),” Otafiire’s letter read in part.

The above stirred confusion in some of the media outlets with several referring to the facility as an entity under Sudhir’s Ruparelia Group. A case in point was WeeklyObserver which blantly ran a story under the headline “Body organ testing: Labour exporters reject Sudhir’s hospital” which according to Ruparelia Group is false report and misleading with intent to tarnish their name.

Through a statement released over the weekend, the group strongly dismissed owning the facility and said the hospital isn’t part of its companies and “has never been”.

“Our attention has been drawn by several online media publications linking the above business entity to Ruparelia group of companies. For clarity, the above mentioned business entity is not part of Ruparelia group of companies, and has never been,” a statement by Ruparelia Group reads partly.

“We appreciate the media for bringing this to our attention, but we also urge them to always verify information before writing. In this case, the correct information about the ownership of Victoria Hospital could have been sought from Uganda registration services Bureau (URSB),” it added.

As much as Tycoon Sudhir acquired Victoria University in 2013, he didn’t acquire Victoria Hopsital and sections of the press have always referred to him as the owner of the hospital that was previously affiliated to the university.