7,000 Nakivale Refugees Declared by OPM Officials Were ‘Ghosts’, Onek Reveals

The Minister for Relief and Disaster Preparedness, Hillary Onek has revealed some of the red flags that prompted the ongoing investigation into the mismanagement of refugee reseources by some officials in the Office of the Prime Minister.

Onek said that the ongoing investigation into mismanagement of refugee resources discovered that up to 7,000 ghost refugees who had been declared by OPM staffers as refugees within Nakivale refugee settlement were later discovered to be non existent.

The Minister was Tuesday addressing a news conference where he refuted some reports in the media that the Office of the Prime Minister is opposed to the ongoing exercise of verification of all refugees in Uganda to ascertain their numbers.

The exercise was prompted by allegations that some officials at the OPM were inflating refugee figures and subsequently stealing resources and provisions meant for refugee programs. But Onek says that government is as committed as donors and UN agencies to undertake the verification and apprehend those found culpable.

He told journalists that preliminary findings in the refugee population in Nakivale refugee settlement in Isingiro district, found that there were thousands of unaccounted for refugees.

“The Somalia refugees were reported to be 16,000 and World Food Program (WFP) was made to supply food for 16,000. And this documentation was being done by OPM officers at the refugee settlements and forwarding them to their headquarters which would then forward them to WFP,” he said.

At that time, WFP would supply food in bulk to refugee settlements without verifying them.

“But a whistleblower came to us and told us the number is not what you are being told,” he said.

As a precautionary measure, WFP instead chose to start a system of distributing the food to registered individual refugees as opposed to the entire camp.

“When they did that, they found out that there were only 9,000 refugees in the camp, meaning the other 7,000 were ghosts. And that caused us as government a big embarrassment,” Minister Onek said.

Onek said that four officers at OPM have so far been suspended and warned the guilty staffers at OPM using the press to obstruct the process that they will be found.

“These are people who think that revalidation will catch up with them. Some of these technocrats will be sorted. Those are the criminals that we are looking for. In fact we might have to send them on leave, so their footprints are checked to see if they are involved,” he said.

Talking to the press after the news conference, Onek said that other allegations about sexual abuse are currently being investigated by the IGG, Police as well as the UN investigators who are looking into the conduct of the UN staffers involved in refugee work.

Uganda’s policy on refugees hailed is hailed by the UN and partners as the best in the world.