Akol’s absence forces MPs to throw URA officials out of parliament

By George Mangula

Parliament’s Committee of Statutory and State Enterprises (COSASE) has thrown out officials from the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) after the tax body Commissioner General Doris Akol failed to appear before the committee.

Committee Chairperson and Kawempe South MP Mubarak Munyagwa said on Tuesday that Akol was the right person to answer all the queries and so the sitting wouldn’t go on without her.
The Committee is meeting URA officials over queries in the 2013/2014 Auditors General’s report which among others include the disappearance of 9000 litres of fuel that were in their custody.

Akol was appointed to that position by Maria Kiwanuka, the then Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, on October 27, 2014.
In their first meeting, the MPs discovered that Government lost over Shs800 million due to URA’s poor storage of seized goods like cement and fuel.

Munyagwa said the MPs on COSASE plan to visit customs points countrywide to establish what really go on there.

The probe of URA officials has now been postponed until May 7, 2019.

Meanwhile, Opposition Chief Whip MP Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda called for strict punishments for Government officials that snub committees arguing that sittings cost tax payer’s money and so should be taken seriously.