KAMPALA – The opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) has said President Museveni’s criticism of the Shs10 billion allocated to Members of Parliament is a diversionary tactic intended to cover up huge sums of money allocated for his own expenditure at State House.
FDC president Patrick Amuriat said that instead of first demanding that MPs account for the Shs10b, Mr Museveni Should first account for the trillions of shillings spent by State House.
“We believe that Museveni ‘s attack is merely diversionary and meant to mislead the public and sway their opinion his favour. The public should not to be fooled by his machinations of him being concerned about misuse of tax payers money,” Mr Amuriat said in a statement released on Monday, May 4, 2020.
He added: “A man whose residence ( State House), spends close to shs.2 billion per day for a whole year, a man who has in the past four months alone received over Shs. 1.3 trillion in classified expenditure under the cover of security, a man who rarely accounts for such money and who never returns even a shilling balance to the State coffers, has no moral authority to condemn anyone for wasting public funds. He is culprit number one. State House is the headquarters of corruption in Uganda. That is where there is the worst abuse of the Budget. That is where they go for supplementary budget almost after every three months.”
According to the FDC leader, the war against COVID 19 in Uganda has been turned into a Mr. Museveni project and anyone seen meddling in it is seen as a detractor.
“That is what Mr. Museveni viewed the actions of the Parliamentary Commission to mean. He wants to take all the credit for the campaign against COVID 19, creatively use it as one of the greatest achievements of his failed Presidency and improve his popularity rating for the coming elections. As he claims to fight COVID 19 his greatest calculation is on how to win the next Presidential election. Museveni never does anything which does not benefit him as a person,” he said.
Mr Amuriat added that most likely, most of the Shs1.3 trillion is going to fund Museveni’s campaigns next year.
” He did the same thing during his presidential campaign in 2010 when without Parliamentary approval as required by the Constitution, raided national reserves in Bank Of Uganda and took away $780m ostensibly for purchasing Mig jet fighters for the Army! He wanted the money to buy votes. He got it and bought big and caused hyper- inflation in the country leading to a sharp rise in essential commodity prices,” Mr Amuriat said.
“This time round he has borrowed the money, a cool €600m, in the name of fighting COVID 19. The money has been turned into a cash bonanza for him and his cronies popularly known as “the mafia”. They have robbed us for a long time, leaving the majority into destitution as they build palaces and grabbing land all over the country,” he added.
The FDC leader said that Covid-19 money should be used to Fight corona, Build, equip and modernize our health system across the country, Pay medical personnel well, Mass testing for corona and Feed the hungry affected by the lockdown.
