The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | The NGO Bureau is undertaking a thorough investigation into Chapter Four Uganda, a human rights organization which is among the 54 organizations suspended two weeks ago. The organizations were suspended for operating without licences, operating with expired licences and failure to submit annual returns.
Chapter Four Uganda was in the category of organizations suspended for failure to submit annual returns. After suspension, Nicholas Opiyo, the organisation’s Executive Director tweeted a receiving slip showing that the organization had submitted its 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 annual returns on January 11, 2021.
But the NGO Bureau Executive Director Stephen Okello told URN in an interview that the receiving slip is proof what the organisation had been accused of. “Chapter Four Uganda had not been compliant with legal requirements. And the submission came after the Bureau wrote to Chapter Four in December warning them that a suspension was in the offing,” Okello said.
“That slip is actually evidence that what the Bureau is saying is correct. “If Chapter Four had produced receiving slips of 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, that would be okay,” Okello said.
In the thorough investigation whose duration Okello didn’t specify, the Bureau will be looking into all the documents that Chapter Four Uganda submitted, trying to understand the organization’s internal operations. At the time of suspension, the Bureau had been with Chapter Four’s documents for eight months.
When asked during the interview why the Bureau suspended an organization that is working towards becoming compliant and why they didn’t let Chapter Four to stay operating as they conduct investigations, Okello argued that such an action would dilute the law.
“Read what the law says, it’s very clear. If you don’t have a valid permit, don’t operate. It brings a timeline of when returns should be submitted. What you’re encouraging us is to relax the law,” he said. “It’s not supposed to be discretion. 2016 up to now, someone should actually appreciate the Bureau. The Bureau is saying, it’s too much.”
Unlike other organizations such as Great Lakes Institute for Strategic Studies (GLISS) headed by Godber Tumushabe and Africa Institute for Energy Governance (AFIEGO) headed by Dickens Kamugisha which said they would close, Chapter Four tweeted that it had closed but promised, “we will be back.”
Opiyo said that the delay was caused by a lack of clarity in the process of filing returns. For instance, he explains, “there were no rules and regulations for fees to be paid for filing returns, and this is the sole reason that the organisation did not comply in 2017. He adds that at the time, they did not know what to pay and which documents to fill and file for returns.
When regulations were put in place, Opiyo says, they required districts to establish district monitoring committees where organizations are supposed to file returns. “There were no district monitoring committees. We were going to KCCA but it was telling us, we don’t know what to do with you, we don’t work with NGOs,” he says.
Opiyo says Chapter Four has complied with the law, albeit, retrospectively, and accuses the Bureau of making false statements.
Nicholas Opiyo’s troubles started in December last year when he spent a week in jail after he was charged with money laundering. The prosecution claimed that Opiyo had on October 8, 2020, at ABSA Bank Garden City Branch, in Kampala District acquired USD 340,000 (about 1.2 billion Shillings) through ABSA Bank Account No.6004078045 in the names of Chapter Four Uganda, knowing at the time of the receipt that the said funds were proceeds of crime.
Opiyo said they have requested a meeting with the NGO Bureau Board which the Executive Director promised would happen by end of this week.
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