Govt Losing Money to its Munyonyo Commonwealth Resort Investment – Audit Report

The Auditor General, John Muwanga has expressed worry that government is losing alot of money due to poor control and performance of State Enterprises and Cooperations.

The Auditor General’s concern was highlighted in the 2018 Audit report that he handed over to the Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga on Friday.

Muwanga said that since 2012, government has made investments in various projects through Uganda Development Cooperation (UDC) amounting to Shs 70.1bn.

“However, projects with investments of Shs 53.2bn are not operational, the only operational project of KIS with an investment of Shs16.9bn and 45.7 percent sharholding by UDC has not declared any profits to UDC since 2012,” Muwanga said.

He reported that some assets like Munyonyo Commonwealth Resort, Nile Hotel, Logistics and Tristar Apparels in which government has ownership over, have not been placed under the management of UDC, the investment and development arm of government.

“Government could be losing a lot of revenue from these investments,” the Auditor General said in his report.

During the preparations of 2007 CHOGM in Kampala, government injected about Shs 15 bn into what was said to be a joint venture with Commonwealth Resort Munyonyo owned by a business tycoon, Sudhir Ruparelia.

Government as well paid Shs 13.9 bn for the construction of marina and pathways making a total investment of Shs 29bn.

However, Sudhir has since insisted that there was no such joint venture arrangement between government and his management.

This explains why the money invested in the resort may never be recovered given the fact that it has never been taken over for management by UDC.

Muwanga as well noted that out of 27 State Enterprises, only 17 (58.6%) made profits during the year and of the profit making enterprises, only one entity (Vision Group) declared dividends to government.