The Ministry of ICT and National Guidance has asked Parliament for an additional Shs45 billion to support the automation of the Parish Development Model (PDM) and the rollout of the Smart City project in a bid to digitize government services and clean up urban infrastructure.
The funding request was presented to the Budget Committee on Wednesday, January 28, 2026, by Iddi Isabirye, the Vice Chairperson of Parliament’s Committee on ICT, as the committee defended its report on the 2026/27 National Budget Framework Paper for the digital transformation programme.
“The Committee was informed that the Ministry has a plan to further automate and roll out electronic government services, including PDM and smart city solutions, and the requirement for this financial year 2026/27 is Shs45 billion,” Isabirye told the Budget Committee.
He added that although the ministry had already been allocated Shs34 billion, this still left a funding shortfall of Shs11 billion.
“However, only Shs34 billion has been allocated, leaving a funding gap of Shs11 billion,” Isabirye said.
However, today (Thursday, 29), while presenting the December 2025 Annual Audit Report to Speaker of Parliament, Anita Among, the Auditor General, Edward Akol revealed that only Shs9.340 billion has been recovered from the 18,105 beneficiaries in 709 Savings and Credit Cooperative Society (SACCOs), in 30 Local Governments (LG) of the 2022 lot, that started the voluntary recovery of the Parish Development Funds (PDM) out of the Shs3.258 Trillion released cumulatively by Government to 10,589 PDM SACCOs.
He highlighted a number of challenges affecting the implementation of the PDM including; funding of non-existing (ghost projects), delays in disbursement of funds to households, implementation of ineligible projects, diversion of funds and duplicate recipients.
The proposal, however, raised scrutiny from several legislators who questioned the justification for additional funding, particularly for the automation of the PDM, which already operates on a digital platform.
Paul Omara, the Otuke County MP, wondered why the government was seeking more funds for PDM automation when the WENDI system is already in place and functional.
“We have had this thing called WENDI, which is the PDM payment platform, and it has already been rolled out. I think it is functioning well,” Omara said.
“So, when you say that the committee recommends that Shs11 billion be provided to enable the government to automate PDM and facilitate smart city solutions and other e-government services, maybe you would expound more,” he added.
Achia Remigio, the MP for Pian County, also questioned the recurring requests for funding by the ICT ministry, citing similar allocations made in the current financial year.
“In the 2025/26 national budget, the Ministry of ICT budgeted for Shs16.1 billion to undertake continuous automation and rollout of government services, but only Shs6.51 billion was provided, creating a funding gap of Shs9.59 billion, which was later allocated,” Achia said.
He noted that for the 2026/27 financial year, the ministry is now seeking Shs45 billion, of which Shs34 billion has been provided, leaving another gap of Shs11 billion.
“So what has the other Shs16.1 billion done? They told us they needed that money and we gave it to them. Now the appetite has gone through the roof,” Achia said.
“Shs34 billion is twice what they requested in the current financial year, and they are still not satisfied. Please interrogate these ministries further and ask them what they did with what was given to them,” he added.
Moses Magogo, the MP for Budiope East, supported funding for the Smart City initiative but faulted the ICT Committee for combining it with the automation of the PDM.
“When you talk about these cables which are scattered all over, we need a centralised way of moving them. You find telecom companies and even government agencies all putting up optic fibre lines in the air, and then we talk about smart cities,” Magogo said.
Musa Noah, the Koboko North MP, sought to clarify the scope of the Smart City project, explaining that it goes beyond automation of government services.
“One of the components is cleaning up cities by removing the optic fibres that are all over the place and putting them into service ducts where every provider can run their fibres,” Noah explained.
He added that the project would also cover traffic management, waste management and other urban services, alongside broader automation of government systems.
“In automation of government services, we are talking about a whole range of services such as e-procurement, the PDM system, education management systems and other government e-platforms,” Noah said.
