By Weswa Ronnie
MBALE
A team from the Emyooga national office met leaders from seven districts of Bugisu; Namisindwa, Mbale, Manafwa, Bududa, Sironko, Bulambuli, and Mbale City during which new tactics of funds recovery were revealed.
The Government of Uganda has injected about 766 billion shillings since the Emyooga program started, according to Rita Namuwenge, the national coordinator of the program.
The meeting that was held at Mbale City chambers on Monday, 5th October, 2026, was attended by Emyooga national leaders, Resident District Commissioners, LCV Chairpersons, town clerks, Chief Administrative Officers, and commercial officers from districts that make up the Bugisu region.
During the meeting, Rita Namuwenge, said that the purpose of the engagement was to get reasons why the recovery of funds is very low and how it can be improved in the Bugisu Sub region.
“Bugisu is one of the regions in the country that has registered poor recovery of Emyooga money, which may affect the disbursement of more funds,” Namuwenge said.
Namuwenge added that Emyooga money is a revolving fund where more disbursement is made by government to a particular district based on the recovery rate.
John Tulinawe, Head of Operations, Emyooga Coordination and Monitoring Unit, State House, said they are going to move to each district to get particulars from commercial officers about who exactly got the money and tell them to refund it.
He said if they defy, they are going to use the security Agencies to arrest the defaulters where they will not be given bond; rather, taken directly to court for remand, based on the new guidelines the President gave them.
Bernard Kitongo, the Commercial Officer of Namisindwa, said that most of the beneficiaries and SACCO leaders who got money have escaped to neighbouring Kenya and other Arab countries, adding that some are saying it was a presidential handshake for the 2026 general elections.
He said it is hard to trace them and ask them to pay, urging government to give district leaders another option for recovering the money.
Geoffrey Natubu, the LCV Chairperson of Bududa District, said most of the LCV leaders in Bugisu are newly elected into their seats, meaning they did not know much about the program.
He said as local leaders they are going to help the technical leaders to sensitize beneficiaries about the advantages of paying back the money to improve recovery so that the region can get more money.
Natubu said, “Some enterprise groups had members who don’t do the enterprise they indicated for their SACCO. For example, in journalists’ SACCOs, most of the members are not journalists,” as one of the reasons that has led to poor recovery in the Bugisu region.
Mbale City Deputy Town Clerk Hasoho Jolly urged her fellow leaders in the region to go back to the drawing board to see how to talk to beneficiaries to recover the money.
According to Emyooga national records, since the Emyooga program commenced, Namisindwa got 1.2 billion shillings and has so far recovered only 450.4 million shillings, Sironko District got 2.8 billion and so far only 556 million has been recovered, Bulambuli got 1.6 billion shillings and only 240 million recovered, Bududa District got 2.5 billion shillings and only 534.4 million shillings has been recovered, among others.
