NITA-U Officials Grilled Over ‘Fraudulent’ USD 16M Huawei Project

The Parliamentary Committee on ICT has kicked off its probe into alleged fraud between the National Information Technology Authority Uganda (NITA-U) and Chinese telecommunications and services firm, Huawei in a USD 16 million optic fibre laying project.

Parliament directed investigations into the alleged fraudulent collusion by NITA-U to give a contract of extending the national backbone infrastructure for extension of ICT optic fiber cables to West Nile region to Huawei, a deal that could cause government to lose Shs 43 billion in inflated costs.

The committee on ICT chaired by Tororo county MP, Annet Nyakecho today interfaced with the NITA-U Executive Director, James Saaka who denied the allegations of fraud in the project.

“The evaluation of the project is being taken by a team from NITA-U and is not influenced by any prospective bidder outside party. Before the issuance of the highest bidder notice, the Authority cannot comment on the outcome of the procurement process,” Saaka said.

However, Budadiri West Member of Parliament, Nathan Nandala Mafabi who unearthed the ‘fraud’ together with other whistleblowers told the committee that his allegations against NITA-U should be examined against the project bidding documents to find out the truth.

He said that Huawei projects conducted for private companies are costing less compared to the similar project which is being executed for government.

The legislators recommended that the matter be probed to avoid further wastage of public resources on fraudulent projects.

The committee chairperson accepted to continue with the probe into this case and asked the NITA-U ED, Saaka to file to the committee a comprehensive report about the alleged fraud in this project.