KADAGA WARNS BOU’S SSEKABIRA ON BLACKMAILING PARLIAMENT

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In Parliament
The Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga on Tuesday afternoon warned Bernard Ssekabira, the Director Financial Markets at Bank of Uganda against blackmailing her office.
An exasperated Ms. Kadaga warned the under fire central bank official that the institution of parliament is not ready to be blackmailed in line of their duties.
This follows a letter she says her office received from Mr. Ssekabira noting concerns on some of the key findings and recommendations of the report by Parliaments committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State enterprises in regard to the closed defunct banks.
The COSASE report that was presented to the house last week on Thursday recommended that the central bank officials involved in the sale of loan portfolios for the five defunct banks be held liable.
The Banks include Green land bank, Global Trust Bank, International Credit Bank, Cooperative Bank, Crane Bank and National Bank of Commerce.
The report pinned Benedict Sekabira and former Executive Director Bank supervision Justine Bagyenda as people who had a conflict of interest in the transaction.
In her communication to parliament on Tuesday evening, Ms Kadaga who didnt divulge the details of Mr. Ssekabiras letter noted that the central bank official concluded that once his concerns are not looked into by the Speaker, it will only indicate that the speaker herself and the entire COSASE committee connived and treated him with bias in the probe done on BOU officials in regard to closure of the defunct banks
Kadaga said: I would like to take exception to part of the content of the letter of Ssekabira where he says; In the event that my requests for a hearing arent met, I will have no option but sue you who is the Speaker and COSASE. I dont know Ssekabira, I have never met him in my life, so I dont know why I should be biased against him.
She described Ssekabiras letter as an attempt to blackmail her, I think he is trying to blackmail me, Parliament, and the Committee. I want to warn that nobody can blackmail this House, no one can blackmail the Speaker and they should stop further attempts.
The Speaker wondered how Mr. Ssekabira would accuse her of bias arguing that she has no interest in COSASE and neither does she have in any other committee, They are all Committees of this House. I dont know this man; I have never talked to him nor even sat with him. And I want to remind the public that the works of the Committees are duties stipulated by law.
She added: It is this House that gives work to these committees, so it is work for us and the public, so let no one try to arm twist and blackmail us in performing our statutory duties. The duties were given to us under the constitution.
Kirkland in their letter to the Speaker argued that the report contains very many false and misleading observations stating; A number of conclusions were reached on such false and fabricated information against our firm and indeed our managing partner without affording us the right to be heard as required by the constitution.
The firm argued that they were not given an opportunity to look at the draft report and neither were they called to an exit meeting on this part of the report and called on Parliament to correct the record, The sad part of the report contains many observations that are based on speculation and conjecture, blatantly false and fabricated informational several recommendations that are illegal on account of violation of the constitution and other laws of Uganda.
They also threatened legal action against Parliament saying the August House should not be misled into adopting this part of the report while it contains such glaring faults of a legal land and factual nature.
The letter read in part; We have submitted this information to your office to draw attention to these very serious concerns with the hope that your office and the Parliament of Uganda will take the opportunity to correct the record, failing which we shall be left with no alternative but to challenge the report in courts of law and seek judicial redress.
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