Kampala, (UG): The Public Accounts Committee (Local Government) has quizzed officials from Kira Municipality in Wakiso District for mismanaging the payroll, resulting into underpayment and overpayment of staff salaries and pensions.
This was revealed in the Auditor General’s Report of the Financial Year 2021-2022 which further revealed ghost workers that have been on pension for years.
The report indicated an individual, who using falsified documents from the Education Service Commission earned over Shs7 million in the year under review and has been on pension for the past seven years.
This irked the committee members who asked the municipality officials to explain the whereabouts of the culpable individual.
“So when staff are posted to your municipality, do you conduct verification or you simply accept whoever is sent to you, how far are you with the case?” asked the committee chairperson, Hon. Gilbert Olanya.
Hon. Patrick Isingoma (Indp., Hoima East Division) demanded that the individual be followed up for legal action, saying this will be a deterrent to any similar attempts in the future.
“it is a common thing, you just report such cases and never follow up. You ought to pursue this case as it may help to stop any likely cases otherwise you are likely to have an avalanche of the same,” said Isingoma.
The report further indicated Shs49 million paid to 10 secondary school employees who were not in the Education Service Commission’s database. “The employees were not in the database and had been on the payroll for an average of 3.5 years,” read the report.
Kira Municipality’s Deputy Town Clerk, Paddy Kakumba, clarified that the staff in question had not been verified by the commission by the time of the audit. He noted that results from the exercise exonerated the 10 employees.
The municipality’s Head of Finance, Geoffrey Muwanga, reiterated: “We never used to cross-check before, we used to trust the decision of the Commission, but going forward, we will first verify before enrolling new staff onto the payroll,” said Muwanga.
Legislators also complained of delayed access of newly recruited staff to the payroll leading to an underpayment of Shs3.1 million. This together with the delayed removal of retired or transferred staff from the payroll dismayed MPs who castigated the officials for laxity.
“Why do you keep on spending public funds on people who are no longer in service?” asked Olanya who further demanded for proof of the municipality’s commitment to recover Shs4 million paid to staff who had retired.
Lira District Woman MP, Linda Auma lashed out at the officials saying, “You are behaving as if it is your first time to be audited. We expect proof that you have recovered the money and the schedule of money to be recovered”.
The Auditor General’s report further faulted the municipality for Shs155 million registered as underpayment in respect of pension and gratuity, which MPs said calls for compensation.
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