KAMPALA, Uganda – Parliament has suspended new guidelines issued by the Ministry of Works and Transport on the absorption of the Shs1 billion district road maintenance fund.
The decision followed concerns raised by Hon. Patrick Nsamba Oshabe (NUP, Kassanda County North), who said the ministry’s permanent secretary, Waiswa Bageya, recently issued new guidelines that capped the cost of rehabilitating district roads at between Shs8 million and Shs20 million per kilometer.
Speaker Anita Among chaired the session.
Nsamba said the new guideline is restrictive and costly, significantly affecting the number of roads or kilometers that can be rehabilitated in a financial year. He urged that the mandate to determine road priorities and costs in the districts be given to the district roads committee.
Under the new guidelines, Nsamba said districts would be able to maintain only about 120 kilometers of roads instead of about 220 kilometers.
“This kills the purpose of this road fund, which was to make all roads motorable,” Nsamba said. “We have district road committees that prioritize what is most effective in their work plans. The ministry should not prescribe how much is used for a particular road.”
Government Chief Whip, Hon. Denis Hamson Obua, agreed with the House’s decision to suspend the new guidelines and pledged to immediately write to the ministry to halt their implementation.
“I will write to the Works Ministry to halt the implementation of new guidelines. In Alebtong, we were doing a kilometer for motorability at Shs3.5 million, and we were able to cover 220 kilometers in one financial year,” Obua said, adding that district roads committees should be given the power to determine how much can be spent per kilometer.
“How can you say a kilometer should be between Shs8 million and Shs20 million? You can’t predetermine the cost without knowing the nature or terrain of the roads,” Speaker Among said before putting the question to suspend the guidelines.
