COSASE Requires Corpulent Asset Register From Departed Asians Property Board – Xavier Radio Ug

Medard Lubega Sseggona, COSASE Chairperson
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Parliament’s Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and Converse Enterprises (COSASE) has ordered the Departed Asians Property Custodian Board (DAPCB) to submit a pudgy and clear checklist of your complete properties under its regulate within weeks.
The directive follows rising issues about fraud, missing records and long delays in promoting or returning properties that had been taken over more than 50 years ago after President Idi Amin’s 1972 expulsion of Asians from Uganda.
The committee, chaired by Mpindi Bumali, the central space advertising consultant of Folks with Disabilities, modified into as soon as reviewing the Auditor Normal’s file for the monetary Twelve months ending June 30, 2024. The file pointed to severe weaknesses within the board’s work. Among the many key complications raised had been an incomplete asset register, properties that secure by no map been valued, failure to aid regular board meetings, and frail supervision of the board’s most indispensable tasks.
The Departed Asians Property Custodian Board modified into as soon as created under the Resources of Departed Asians Act of 1973 to organize and do away with properties left on the aid of after Amin expelled about 80,000 Asians. The law requires the board to aid correct records, fee properties and sell them through delivery and exquisite processes. Nonetheless, auditors stumbled on that a range of these requirements have not been entirely met.
The Board’s Govt Secretary, George William Bizibu, admitted that the board doesn’t yet secure a total property register. Nonetheless, he added that the delays are due to an ongoing verification and guidance from Parliament and promised that a brand unusual gazette perceive will seemingly be issued earlier than the board is wound up and that a pudgy register will seemingly be printed.
Nevertheless some MPs weren’t pleased. Richard Muhumuza Gafabusa, MP for Bwamba County, puzzled how the board has been accumulating income and promoting properties with out a verified checklist. “What did you gazette? Salvage you secure an asset registry, and does it contain values? What attain you coarse disposals on?” he requested.
Bizibu stated sold properties survive the checklist till investors’ total fee. He also stated the board had a work conception, even though it modified into as soon as no longer offered to auditors.
The audit also published that 115 properties that had been compensated in the course of the British Excessive Commission in 1999 secure silent no longer been valued, whereas 87 properties compensated in the course of the United International locations Excessive Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have not been sold.
These delays, some stretching over a long time, extend the hassle that the properties will seemingly be grabbed by third parties or claimed fraudulently. The file warns that this is in a position to seemingly perchance end result in courtroom battles and loss of executive income.
For the reason that Nineties, Uganda has compensated owners for 344 properties in the course of the United International locations. In 2025, the manager started unusual verification of more than 200 claimants and gave them six months to level to ownership amid allegations of fraud, including double payments and illegal gross sales.
Juliet Kinyamatama, the Rakai Girl MP, known as for greater transparency. “Will we gaze proof of the course of? It ought to be agreed upon by the board so we can aid you to blame,” she stated.
Francis Mwijukye, the MP for Buhweju County, warned about ghost claimants and puzzled whether ministers had donated properties delivery air agreed procedures. To this, Bizibu admitted that there had been circumstances where ministers feeble their powers to donate properties, nonetheless he didn’t present little print.
The law requires the board to satisfy every month. Nonetheless, at some stage within the period under overview, the board met easiest as soon as, on July 29, 2023. Handwritten notes within the audit blamed ministers’ busy schedules. MPs stated this reveals frail management and sorrowful governance.
A earlier winding-up conception modified into as soon as drafted in 2021-2022, nonetheless no progress has been made since. Parliament has also halted the manager’s rationalisation conception on memoir of of unresolved property cases.
For quite loads of Ugandans, these properties signify untapped economic fee. Nevertheless with out a clear and verified register, there might perchance be a hassle of theft, immoral allocations and continued corruption. Bizibu told the committee that Parliament had insisted the board can no longer be wound up with out a clear stock.
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