Police fails to account for UGX 1.2 billion NTR collections

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Police officials have failed to account for up to 1.2 billion shillings which was collected under Non-Tax Revenues during the financial year 2016/2017 and 2017/2018. Police’s Non-Tax Revenue is generated from express penalties, firearm certificates and guard fees.

During the two financial years, the force collected 23.14 billion Shillings as Non-Tax Revenue, but only remitted 22.5 billion Shillings to the Consolidated Fund. Under the provisions of the law, only 6 percent of the collections is returned to the Police Force for its own welfare expenditure.

The Police Head of Accounts Richard Katongole told the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament that the difference of 1.2 billion Shillings was Cash-in-Transit, waiting to be transferred from the Bank to the Consolidated Fund, by the end of the financial year.

But the explanation was rejected by committee members; Wilberforce Yaguma and Jessica Ababiku who hinted on confidential information relating to funds being kept on a personal fixed deposit account of a Senior Police officer.

Although Katongole maintained that the money was transferred, he failed to table evidence indicating so. The legislators pointed out that the Police Statement of Accounts does not have any indication of the money being transferred at a later stage to the Consolidated Fund.

Under Secretary Rogers, Muhirwa Muhirwa explained that Police’s Non-Tax Revenue is collected by Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) and that they do reconciliation of receipts at every end of the month. He, however, asked for more time to reconcile their figures on NTR and provide an explanation to the committee.

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