National Unity Platform has asked the former leader of Opposition Hon Mathias Mpuuga to step down as commissioner of Parliament after he admitted that he took Shs500million as a service award pay.
This was revealed in a statement released by the National Unity Platform.
Below is the statement.
NATIONAL UNITY PLATFORM
29th February, 2024
STATEMENT ON CORRUPTION AND ABUSE OF OFFICE
There is an ongoing online protest under the hashtag #UgandaParliamentExhibition. The protest aims to expose the massive corruption, abuse of office and gross mismanagement of public affairs by the leadership of Parliament and other leaders.
Unfortunately, the protest has not only revealed grand corruption on the side of NRM leaders. Some leaders on the opposition side have had serious allegations of corruption levelled against them.
Specifically, our former Leader of the Opposition in Parliament and current Parliamentary Commissioner, Rt. Hon. Mathias Mpuuga alongside three other Parliamentary Commissioners have been accused of irregularly awarding themselves huge sums of tax-payers money on the pretext of “Service Awards”.
Under the scheme, Rt. Hon. Mpuuga was allocated 500,000,0001= (Five Hundred Million Uganda Shillings).
On Wednesday 28th February 2024, the President convened an urgent meeting comprised of senior leaders of the Party including all Deputy Presidents and some of our senior legislators.
At the meeting, Rt. Hon. Mpuuga admitted that he indeed took part in this wrongdoing and apologised for the same.
In light of this, he was strongly advised that the moral thing to do in the circumstances is to step down from his role as Parliamentary Commissioner with immediate effect.
The nation will recall that the values of the National Unity Platform are Discipline, Reliability, Inclusiveness, Integrity, Patriotism and Service.
All actions of corruption and abuse of office go contrary to these values. They also go contrary to the Integrity Oath which every leader of the Party swore at the start of this term.
We, therefore, ask our leaders at all levels to do self-reflection and recommit themselves to these values and the Oath they took to shun and fight corruption in all its forms.
