By Mary Asujo
Parliament’s committee on Commission Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises- COSASE chaired by Nakawa West MP, Joel Ssenyonyi has handed over Uganda Airline’s CEO and former CEO to Police to record statements.
The Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities, and State Enterprises (COSASE) chaired by Joel Ssenyonyi, tasked the CEO Ms Jenifer Bamuturaki failed to table evidence to her academic papers and the former CEO Eng. Ephraim Kalyebara Bagenda for continuously failing to account even when he was part of the decision making team.
Yesterday, COSASE pinned Jenifer Bamuturaki for lack of the requisite qualification to be appointed the Chief Executive Officer of the Uganda National Airlines Company. The committee was also shocked by salary disparities at the government airline company with top officials drawing more than UGX50 million every month despite it’s problems.
The explanation by the CEO to the committee that her efforts to try and get her transcript from Makerere University have been futile was dismissed by the legislators including Kazo County Dan Atwijukire Kimosho, Lamwo district Woman MP, Nancy Achora, and PWD Mpindi Bumali who wondered how a CEO of her caliber can fail to attain her transcript or testimonial from Makerere University having graduated in 1994.
Hon. Mpindi Bumali and Martin Mugabi Muzaale, the Buzaaya County MP said it’s disturbing that the former CEO continues to say he cannot remember or doesn’t know whenever he was asked to respond to various querries and continuously referring every query to the Works Ministry.
Mawokota South MP, Yusuf Nsibambi said that the issue of academic qualification especially in government agencies is key as it appears issues of academic qualifications no longer matter in Uganda. “This means that as a committee, there is need to look at government agencies as it appears like there are several incompetent people in the agencies and this is a big problem for the country” Nsibambi said.
Similarly, Bamuturaki was expected to come along with her Curriculum Vitae accompanied by academic documents which she did not prompting Mr Ssenyonyi to remind the members the need to also scrintinse the academic qualifications of other senior managers.
The committee further discovered that most of the senior managers at the agency had no minimum academic qualifications with a certificate as being the highest qualification amid concerns about huge salary payments.