Ban Ki Moon and President Museveni were speaking during a bilateral meeting at the sidelines of the UN High Level Thematic Debate on UN cooperation with Regional and Sub-Regional Organisations in the maintenance of global peace and security for development.

The two leaders also discussed Regional issues covering Burundi, Somalia, South Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo -DRC. The Secretary General thanked the President for sparing time to come and deliver the key note address.

Ban Ki Moon commended President Museveni and other regional leaders for their efforts that brought peace to Burundi leading to the democratic transition. He also thanked President Museveni for his efforts in stabilizing Somalia under AMISOM.

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Since that incident a lot has been said in the media about the incident by individuals, parliaments and the airline company. The Kenyan parliament is investigating the case, and KQ officials termed the situation as ‘regrettable’.

However, looking at all this I can only wonder what the hullabaloo is all about. A plane with the number of clients and passengers that KQ has should not be one that changes its course on the whim of one person – even if it is a head of state. Landing at an unplanned location without the security provided for as at an International airport would have been a bad call. Whoever made the call to not divert from the planned course must have heard the thousands of people who would be changing their mind and not using KQ again because their planned trajectory may or may not be adhered to.

The President’s ire at the situation is misplaced too because if he would think past his hurt pride he would see that given the chance he would have made the same call as the airline. Responding positively to his request would have set a bad precedent for the airline because next time they would not be able to decline any such requests of other heads of state and therefore not giving KQ passengers faith in the airline. Passengers need to know that they will get to where they are going on time, safely and with the least inconveniences.

The incident may have caused the President of Uganda to lose faith in the airline but it strengthened the current and prospective passengers’ faith in its reliability. KQ said loudly that the passenger comes first.

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President Museveni wants The Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Authority (PPDA) act be amended such that when questions are raised over the tendering process the company which has won the tender in a process perceived to be unfair should continue with its works while the complaints are looked into by the courts of law or any other authority. Museveni barred his heart while he was meeting his government officials in UGANDAN capital city, Kampala, this week.

Currently according to the PPDA Act, the works are supposed to be halted until a final decision is taken either by the courts or any other authority.

But the president is not explaining what happens if the so called winner of the tender ends up doing shoddy works? What about if the petitioner wins the case in courts or in any other authority?

It looks if the MPs and Ugandans in general follow Museveni’s submission; the taxes of Ugandans would be lost.

But the advice is simple. President Museveni and his government should clean up the procurement process and ensure that there is no corruption.

Each year Uganda loses 500 billion shillings through corruption and out of this 300 billion is lost through procurement (According to the World Bank). Reports indicate that its Uganda Government officials who ask for kick backs leading to challenges in procurement process. The current PPDA act is in place to protect Ugandans from bad contractors.

By Walakira Nyanzi

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