By Our Reporter
SOROTI CITY
Parliament’s Public Accounts Subcommittee has handed over senior Kaberamaido District officials to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) for further interrogation over more than UGX 751 million in unaccounted Road Maintenance Grant (RMG) funds flagged in the Auditor General’s report for the Financial Year 2023/2024.
The officials in question are Chief Finance Officer, Ojur Francis, and District Engineer, Elomunait David, who were taken into CID custody after failing to defend audit queries on Monday, 19th August, 2025.
They were part of a team led by Chief Administrative Officer, Henry Ddamba, and LCV Chairperson, Victor Rex Ekesu, that appeared before the Subcommittee sitting in Soroti on Monday.
The committee, chaired by Jonam County MP, Ongiertho Emmanuel Jor, is currently pitch-camped in Soroti City to scrutinize the Auditor General’s findings for the Teso and Karamoja sub-regions, covering Soroti and Moroto areas.
To speed up the process, the committee has split itself into smaller sub-committees, each assigned to handle specific districts under review.
According to the Auditor General’s report, Kaberamaido District received over UGX 1 billion in Road Maintenance Grant funds, but a large portion was mismanaged. The discrepancies include:
Unimplemented road works worth UGX 301,450,200 covering 58.3km.
Non-compliant procurement of materials valued at UGX 77,672,790.
Diversion of funds totaling UGX 26,200,850.
Irregular expenditure of UGX 70,066,650 on non-road activities.
Unaccounted expenditure of UGX 751,982,951 on road works without documentation.
Overlapping projects, where roads funded in 2023/2024 appeared again in the 2024/2025 allocations despite full payment.
Unaccounted fuel consumption from Shine Energy (U) Ltd in at least 25 instances.
Duplicate payments using different vouchers for the same works.
Speaking after the hearing, MP Ongiertho Emmanuel Jor expressed sharp disappointment:
“Kaberamaido, we must say we are very disappointed. First of all, their audits have a qualified opinion, and when you have that, it means something is substantially bad. For them, what was substantially bad was their accountability for the one billion grant for roads. Out of that, they could not account for 750 million, and you can clearly see elements of fraud. That is the problem Kaberamaido has. We have handed them over to CID and ordered that the monies be refunded by the responsible persons.”
It has also emerged that these irregularities had earlier been flagged by the out-gone Deputy RDC, Kisenene Hood, and the Assistant RDC, Arikos Peter, who is still in office. On June 13, 2025, they wrote an urgent letter to the CAO demanding immediate recovery of the funds and citing evidence — including photos and videos — of incomplete works and suspicious fuel transactions. The letter required action within 48 hours and directed the responsible officers to prepare to record statements with police.
CID sources now say both the CFO and the District Engineer are expected to be released on bond as investigations continue
