The Public Accounts Committee-PAC of Parliament was Tuesday left in shock, when the Judiciary Permanent Secretary Kagole Kivumbi who was summoned to appear before legislators, was no show.
Chaired by the Budadiri West MP Nathan Nandala Mafabi, the committee had summoned Grace Akullo, the Director Criminal Investigations (CID) to take part in its proceedings with Judiciary officials following a whistleblower’s petition indicating that Shillings 34 billion could have been misappropriated.
On Monday, Mafabi made the decision to summon the officials following scrutiny of the expenditure of Shillings 34 billion, which was questioned by the Auditor General. The committee chairman also noted on Thursday last week that his committee received a petition in line with the alleged misappropriation of funds by the Permanent Secretary, Kagole Kivumbi in connivance with other officials in the Judiciary.
The money according to Kagole was spent on operational court costs, mediation, Court sessions, imprest, locus visits, HIV medical allowances and Monitoring and Evaluation since these items lack direct budget lines. However, a scrutiny of a detailed document indicating how the funds were spent revealed that some of the money had been wired into individual accounts of different Judicial officers and Justices for various reasons including operational funds, payment of tuition and medical fees among others.
“In a week, you have got over 100 million Shillings, next week you have another 100 million, what are you doing with it? We suspect forgery in the accounts and theft of public funds,” Nandala said. He also noted that the whistleblower’s information correlates with what his committee has partly discovered in the Judiciary accounts.
He was expected to lead a team of officials from Judiciary before PAC to answer to audit queries in vain. The Judiciary Chief Registrar, Esther Nambayo however told the committee that Kivumbi’s whereabouts are unknown since he didn’t make any formal communication about his absence or even delegate his Under Secretary to account for funds appropriated in the financial year 2017/2018.
"We were told to come back today, the accounting officer was to lead us but we were not able to get him in office or communicate to him and we thought we would meet him here. As we waited here, a lawyer came and told me that he had been sent to represent the Permanent Secretary," said Nambayo.
Nambayo when asked to identify the lawyer, pointed out Obed Mwebesa who said that his verbal instructions to appear before PAC were abrupt. Mwebesa explained to the committee that Kagole was indisposed and this didn’t go down well with legislators who demanded that Kagole be dragged before the Committee, saying that his behavior was in contempt of parliament.
Nandala also noted that the petitioners would also interface with the CID on their claims.
