By Godwin Abedican

Arua

Stake holder in West Nile have been asked to champion the fight against corruption to streamline and improve service delivery to the citizens in the region.
The Government of Uganda has been implementing Zero-Tolerance to Corruption through the Sector Wide approach. Zero-Tolerance to corruption is one of the cornerstones of good governance.

This entails continuous evaluation of the effectiveness of public officials to ensure that they are performing to their full potential, providing value for money in the provision of public services, instilling confidence in the Government and being responsive to the community they are meant to be serving.

This is the first ever Policy on Zero-Tolerance to Corruption in Uganda, which aims at ensuring a transparent, accountable, efficient and effective use of public resources, and maps out each Anti-Corruption Agency`s contribution to the attainment of the Policy and ultimately the National Development Plan (NDP) Outcome.

While opening the Sub-region validation meeting of National Anti-Corruption Strategy for financial years 2019/2020 to 2023/2024 for West Nile Sub-region held at Heritage courts in Arua city on Tuesday 14^th November 2023, Ham Muzamil Ezama, the deputy resident city commissioner for Arua city noted that, the fight against corruption can only be won if it is championed by every individual at the grassroots level. “The human beings who are corrupt come from homes, they know about corruption very well, but they pretend not to be corrupt. You can sugarcoat corruption but one time it will always appear,” he said.

He adds that the fight against corruption is further complicated because the office bearers have become too smart in their moves and are always determined to defend themselves which needs the deployment of proper tactics and the law.

Hon. Jackson Lee Atima Buti, the Member of Parliament for Arua central Division and the government chief whip for the region of West Nile in his remarks says, a lot of corruption issues continue to be unearthed across the region of west Nile, which need very keen attention. “The government is doing all that it takes to give services to the people but the services end up in the hands of corrupt officials. We get blamed that tis government is doing nothing and yet a lot of money is poured in trying to help the citizens and it pains me when I see government pouring money to develop this city and other districts in the region and the monies end up in the pockets of people.” Atima lamented.

Kenneth Kauta, the Principal Ethics Officer in the Directorate for Ethics and Integrity, calls for an action oriented approach towards handling corruption related issue in the region of west Nile. “I am appealing to my colleagues who are in the main stream, reactionary approach is needed to take up some of the issues of corruption raised in the region. We should be open, we should be objective. We should be really factual and never hide anything under the carpet,” Kauta urged.

The validation meeting was convened to disseminate and validate the assessment report on the implementation of the zero tolerance to corruption of 2019 in the Sub-region of West Nile.

COVER PHOTO: Ham Muzamil Ezama, the deputy resident city commissioner for Arua city speaks while openning the engagement By Godwin Abedican