MBARARA CITY TRADERS TREASURER STEALS 50M, FLEES

By Twesigye Aggrey
In Mbarara—–
The business community who have been saving money since 2014 to construct an arcade along Mbaguta street in Mbarara city,are crying foul after the Treasurer,Mary Kiconco vanished with over shs .50 million savings ,www.mknewslink.com news website has learnt.

Members of Mbaguta street owners condominium company limited reportedly learnt about the missing funds on Thursday in meeting convened at Mbarara city council hall.

The money is part of the eight year savings of 131 members of the association, majority of whom are the business community.

Its worth noting that in 2014,the then Mbarara municipal council subleased a portion of land along Mbaguta street to the members for a period of ten years to develop it,however since then the land has been lying idle.

Charles Ngabirano the Association chairman told the members that the Treasurer re-signed due to illness and is currently hospitalized in Kampala.

He mentioned that the assembly appointed a finance committee to probe the situation.

Background.
In 2014,the Association awarded a contract to Coronation Developers for the construction of a six-story arcade ,with a budget of 23 billion shillings.An agreement was reached with the contractor to make an advance payment,backed by a bank guarantee of shs.7billion.Despite managing to pay 970 million,the association discovered discrepancies in the payments made to the contractor.

Out of the shs.1.242 billion shillings realized by the association ,only 970 million was accounted for , leaving the members with unanswered questions and a balance of 143 million shillings in their account