Civil society Organizations have written an open letter to the president demanding him not to grant the Members of parliament to take the Shs10 billion as its being proposed.
According to organizations under their body Civil Society Budget Advocacy Group (CSBAG), parliament using the sh10b in any manner they deem fit, is promoting illegitimacy and undermine the prudent public finance management system.
CSBAG executive director, Julius Mukunda says the money being proposed should instead be allocated to facilitate a team of researchers at Makerere University who are in the process of developing quick low cost COVID-19 test kits.
According to the researchers, the test kits will be able to show results within a few minutes and will require only Shs4,000 for each test to be conducted.
The researchers indicated that they require about Shs3.9 billion to produce the test kits.
“While the Parliament of Uganda has justified this allocation as facilitation to enable the MPs to provide oversight of COVID-19 response funds, other MPs have made public declarations that Parliament should reverse the transactions “the CSOs noted.
During the consideration of the sh304b supplementary budget for the fight against COVID-19, Parliament allocated itself sh10b.
The legislature was not among the essential sectors that had initially been budgeted for by the government to receive any additional funding for the fight against COVID-19.
The money in question is meant to facilitate the Members of parliament to senstize the community about the COVID-19.
