Corruption mars Uganda privatisation

According to the state-owned New Vision newspaper, the MPs accuse State Minister for Finance, Sam Kutesa, of five counts of abuse of office and influence.
The allegations relate to the divestiture of the lucrative Entebbe Air Handling Services from the main bulk of the state-owned Uganda Airline Corporation.

The grounds for the accusations were contained in a controversial 60-page report on the privatisation process tabled in parliament earlier this month, which claimed that four ministers and one senior official had "derailed" the exercise.
The Parliamentary Speaker, Francis Ayume, is now waiting to cross-check the signatures on the petition, following confusion over a censure motion against another minister earlier this year, when some MPs claimed afterwards that they had withdrawn their names.
Mr Ayume says he will hand over the petition to President Museveni next week.
The MPs have called on Mr Kutesa to resign, otherwise they will use article 118 of the constitution against him to censure him in a parliamentary vote.
Other corruption charges
There have been several other allegations of corruption and mismanagement in the Ugandan privatisation process.


On Thursday, President Museveni confirmed that he had accepted the resignation of the Minister of State for Privatisation, Matthew Rukikaire, because of his handling of the government's divestiture of its interest in the Sheraton Hotel and the Uganda Commercial Bank (UCB).
According to local papers Mr Museveni will also probe other ministers implicated in corruption.
Vice-President Specioza Wandira Kazibwe was quoted as saying: "The president will investigate, without prejudice, malice or witchhunting all the ministers featuring in the select committees' reports and in the media in order to pin responsiblity for failure of supervision in the departments under their control."

Two weeks ago, President Museveni's brother, Major-General Salim Saleh, also resigned after the report alleged that he had engineered the improper takeover of 49% of shares in UCB.