Kaliro district commercial officer on the run after misappropriation of emyooga funds

Kaliro, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | The Kaliro district commercial officer, Chris Muwanika, is wanted for allegedly fleeing with Shillings 300 million meant for the Emyooga program. Muwanika is accused of using his office to generate a fake list of Emyooga beneficiary bank accounts, which he used to withdraw the money undetected.

He allegedly decided to flee into hiding after noticing that the district leadership had filed a complaint of fraud against him at Kaliro central police station. Michael Kasadha, the Busoga North police spokesperson told journalists on Wednesday that Muwanika’s whereabouts are unknown. He however said that police have deployed a team of detectives to hunt him down.

Kasadha explained that Muwanika is wanted on two counts of fraud and causing financial loss to the government. Kaliro LCV chairperson, Elijah Kagoda says that the Emyooga program has failed to materialize desirable development goals largely because most of the groups were infiltrated by nonresidents and powerful individuals with links to politicians and civil servants, who were cleared to easily access the funds at the expense of smallholder business operators and farmers.

He says that they have since instituted tough measures to ensure proper management of parish development model funds in a bid to avoid fraud. The Emyooga program is apresidential initiative on wealth and job creation. The program targets Ugandans, especially in the informal sector, that come together in form of savings and credit cooperative societies.

*****

URN