Bank of Uganda (BoU) is experiencing another unrest after Governor Emmanuel Tumusiime Mutebile appointed his relative among individuals for positions advertised following the retirement of several directors and expiry of contracts.
On April 24 BoU internally advertised seven positions which included the Executive Director for Operations and for Information Technology. The other positions were; Directors for Non-Bank Financial Institutions, Medical, Human Resources, Financial Stability and Financial Markets.
According to the source in the Bank, several people applied for various advertised positions to see themselves growing in their respective fields of banking. The source said they were warming to have interviews. To their dismay, the governor halted the process and decided to appoint members from a given click fight others in the Bank.
The BOU Board of Directors insists that the positions should competently be fill however the governor has taken the opposite direction and appointed his close associates.
“The governor was not allowed at time of advertising but the board had reached a conscious and directed human resource department to advertise and seen vacant positions filled. On halting the process, the governor said he has to consult with the president first before letting the Human resource department to go on with the process.” the source said.
Among issues to be discussed, the source said, were BOU act which seeks to trim the Governor’s powers among others. And last month, Mutebile and the board of directors headed to state House Entebbe to meet President Museveni. On reaching the state house, the President dissed them saying that he has a lot of things to do and therefore he did not give them time. He directed them to go and solve in-house issues.
The source said that Mutebile had briefed President Museveni before the group traveled to the state house. Mutebile and sections of individuals are at a loggerheads with board members because of how some activities are carried out at the bank.
The appointed members include; Valentine Ojangole who was appointed Executive Director Operations replacing Marry Katarikawe. Ojangole is the only reported to have minimum requirements. Jacob Opolot who was appointed Ag economic advisor to the governor replacing Brown Bleach whose contract expired. Opolot is at the level of Executive Director this contradicts the bank’s structures.
The others are; Nakayiza Sincia- director Banking, she replaced Mr. Ojangole. Christine Namanya was reportedly appointed Ag executive director Human Resources and Lawrence Orobo who was appointed to head financial markets and Lumanzi who was brought up by the governor himself was named Ag director non-banks.
“Many of the appointees don’t qualify for those positions according to Bank structures. It is regrettable that it takes long for these issues to be known and BOU decisions are irreversible. The bank is going to its knees if they continue making such decisions,” The source said.
Efforts to reach communication manager in BOU were futile since no one answered our calls.
It should be recalled that in February 2018 Tumusiime-Mutebile made staff changes where he replaced former executive director of supervision Justine Bagyenda with Dr. Tumubweine Twinemanzi.
A committee that was appointed by President Yoweri Museveni to investigate staff changes would later establish that Tumusiime-Mutebile made some transfers and appointed Twinemanzi without consulting other members of the BoU board, a decision they said was wrong as the governor had no powers to make changes single handedly.
Worse still, most of the staff head picked by the governor did not meet the qualifications and experience required for the jobs. For instance, Dr. Tumubweine does not have any experience in commercial banking.
