By Our Reporter
BUKWO
A Senior local government official of Bukwo district yet to be named stole a coffee huller and generator given to the district to help coffee farmers by the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industries, and Fisheries in 2013.
The official then reportedly hid the two machines valued at Shs500M in a bush house in Kabei sub-county in Bukwo district with plans of selling them to Kenya.
This official’s 40 days however elapsed yesterday 1st August 2022 when the Bukwo Resident District Commissioner and LC V Chairperson after getting a tip off from a whistleblower recovered the two items.
The huller is used to peel pre-dried coffee beans. Julius Chelimo, the Bukwo District LC V Chairperson, says that they recovered the machine with the help of a whistleblower.
He, however, says that despite the fact the machine was never installed, the district wrote to the ministry in 2014 claiming that it had been installed.
“Since the huller machine was brought to Bukwo it has never been tested to work something we are wondering what was going on with our previous leaders,” he said.
According to Chelimo, there is no reason for the people of Bukwo to complain that government is not supporting them, adding that many things were delivered to the district for public use but the public was never informed. This is the time Bukwo officials are recovering government property being hidden with the intention to sell in Bukwo.
On July 3rd, 2022, the Bukwo Resident District Commissioner, Samuel Hashaka Mpimbaza, and LC V Chairperson, Julius Chelimo recovered a grader hidden from the home of a civil servant with some missing parts.
In the same month, the officials discovered a milk cooler and generator valued at Shillings 300m being kept at the Uganda-Kenya border in Suam with intentions of being sold to Kenya. Mpimbaza says that many government properties meant to help improve the well-being of the community in Bukwo have been sold off by individuals.
“We are following all those equipment slowly by slowly and we urge the community to give information to the RDC and LC V’s offices on whatever they see hidden,” he said.
Calvin Chemusto, one of the residents and a coffee farmer wondered why they have been suffering with their coffee yet government had sent a coffee huller to the district.
“It is really hurting most of us the people of Bukwo when you see how Government officials are messing up with everything that Government sends to help people in Bukwo sometimes I ask myself whether it was necessarily to have Bukwo district,” he said.
-businessfocus.co.ug
