Kampala Lord mayor Erias Lukwago has always been on good terms with his fellow Muslim the Kampala minister Minsa Kabanda and has been avoiding going to war with her. Their friendship has been on since Kabanda advised the president to reduce on the mistreatment of a popular elected leader like Lukwago. She also pushed hard for the Lord mayor to get his salary arrears, which had accumulated to 800m since Musisi’s days.
But now that honey moon is over as Lukwago is very bitter and accusing Minsa Kabanda of mismanaging the multi-trilion Greater Kampala Metropolitan Area development project which is worth USD600M. Its funded by the world Bank to build and develop modern roads, bridges and markets infrastructure in the GKMA districts of Kampala, Wakiso, Mukono and parts of Mpigi.
The Kampala affairs ministry has been in charge of the program a lot with Kabanda being seen everywhere launching road works. This week she was joined with minister Raphael Magyezi to commission the works in Mukono and Kira for Wakiso district.
Lukwago now says that Kabanda who wants to stand for Kampala central MP Seat in 2026, is mismanagement the program by diverting money to her office and ministry offices for technocrats to eat it instead of putting it on roads to do the real work. Lukwago says that the French government recently came on board to boost the world bank and gave them an additional USD48m of which USD18m, which is like Ugx60bn, has been hijacked and diverted to Minsa Kabanda’s office as minister for Kampala.
He says this is betrayal to the people of Kampala who are suffering because of poor drainage and bad roads. Lukwago says that because of Minsa’s diversion of funds, drainage channels like Nakukolongo, near Kitebi where she stays, won’t be worked on. Lukwago says it’s very unfair and insensitive for Minsa Kabanda to spend up to 60bn to buy cars, chairs, ACs, computers, laptops and MiFis instead of working on more roads.
He has vowed to mobilize his lord councilors and the ordinary people of Kampala to fight Minsa Kabanda until she surrenders. Minsa Kabanda has defended herself by saying there is nothing wrong with her ministry taking 60bn to recruit staff, buy cars and computers on top of hiring staff because they too are part of the same government of Uganda which brought the USD600m from the world Bank and the USD48m from the government of France.
Kabanda has also advised Erias Lukwago to politically grow up and calm down instead of inciting Lord councilors and Kampala voters for nothing. Lukwago is also quarrelling about money meant to compensate project affected persons to facilitate acquisition of the land where the project will be passing. He says Kabanda must explain where that money has gone because the supposed beneficiaries haven’t seen it at all.
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https://ultimatenews.co.ug/2024/07/time-for-battle-lukwago-raises-red-flag-over-shs60bn-scandal-at-kampala-affairs-ministry/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=time-for-battle-lukwago-raises-red-flag-over-shs60bn-scandal-at-kampala-affairs-ministry