Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) lost over Shs 1 billion in overpayments and other unjustified expenditures in the year ending June 2021.
According to the Auditor General’s report, KCCA spent more than Shs 1.3 billion in overpayments and other irregular payments on different construction projects mostly roads funded under the Kampala Institutional Infrastructure Development Project II (KIIDP II).
KCCA also spent Shs 80.85 million for relocation of NITA utilities which were not verified, overpaid Shs 215.9 million while another Shs 503.7 million remains unaccounted for.
The listed expenditures happened during the construction of Kulambiro Ring road, Spur-Najjera road, Nakawa-Ntinda road and John Babiiha Avenue. KCCA further made payments of over Shs 46 million and Shs 248.2 million during the construction of Kabuusu–Bunamwaya–Lweza road.
The authority further made excess payments of over Shs 14 million and over Shs 16 million during the construction of Ntinda II road. Also, during the construction of phase one of Kitintale market, over Shs 119.7 million was spent on materials (quantities of steel reinforcement) in excess of those in the bar bending schedule. All road construction works except for Ntinda II road and Spur-Najjera road are under KIIDP II.
“I advised the accounting officer to ensure that the amounts certified and paid in excess of the quantities executed, unaccounted for payments and irregular/unjustified payments are recovered from the contractors prior to concluding the contracts,” the auditor general says.
The spokesperson of the KIIDP II Agnes Biribonwa said that before they spent any money, the World Bank would verify the need and approve the expenditure. She added that interruptions that caused delays in the project also caused extra costs to the project.
John Mary Ssebuwufu, the city executive secretary for finance and administration says they are yet to get an explanation from the technical staff at KCCA on how the payments were made. He adds that they are equally waiting for the report for discussion by the city executive committee.
Faridah Nakabugo, the chairperson of the KCCA engineering committee says the committee shall soon convene to discuss the matter and ensure that there is accountability from the technical staff. Nakabugo says they have been asking for an audit report from the public accounts committee of KCCA but are yet to receive it.
“We asked for the report to get accountability of expenditures on roads, drainage channels and other construction projects undertaken by KCCA. But now that the auditor general’s report is highlighting some of the issues, we shall engage the technical staff to get an explanation of the quoted expenditures,” Nakabugo says.
Makindye East three councillor and chairperson of the gender community, services and production committee Mosh Afrikan Ssendi, says the report exposes the abuse of office and corruption at KCCA which the council has always sought to check by demanding for accountability.
Ssendi says political leaders at KCCA asked for accountability into the renovation of the Old taxi Park to ascertain the expenditure of the over Shs 10.9 billion but were ignored. He says it’s unfortunate that taxpayers’ money is being wasted by those entrusted to deliver services to the public.
“That report states exactly the kind of complaints we have been having as council at KCCA. There is massive abuse of office and over expenditure, corruption and lots of unexplained fundings and lots of unexplained suits that are happening at KCCA. It is very sad to see that lots of money is been spent. I can give you an example of diversion and there are investigations going on right now because we asked for an audit investigation into the amount of money spent on working in the old taxi park. That is in excess of Shs 10 billion. When we visited the site we noticed that what was being claimed wasn’t what was on the ground. There is totally nothing, no toilet, no fencing, no lighting. Basically, no nothing yet Shs 11 billion was spent to try and modernise the taxi park,” said Ssendi.
