Chaos marred Fort Portal municipality council meeting as the Principal Treasurer Karamagi Simon accused of financial misappropriation stormed out threatening to stone the sergeant at arms and councilors who had escorted him to ease himself.
On Monday this week, the speaker Gilbert Kayondo adjourned council after Karamagi who was wanted to explain the alleged misappropriation of local revenue millions of shillings failed to appear. Council gave him up to August 26 to present the financial statement on local revenue.
On Thursday, during a council meeting Joseph Rugamba a councilor representing the elderly tasked Karamagi to explain queries of revenue and expenditure for the period July 1 2015 to June 30 2016.
Eunice Abomugisha the chairperson finance committee asked the treasurer to explain why finance reports indicated 100% revenue collection yet in his reports, the treasurer only indicated 56% leaving the 44% unexplained.
Reports allege that close to Ugshs 80 million in local revenue has gone missing.
Asked why he dodges the finance committee meeting, Karamagi said; “I attended all the meetings from the start to the end”.
He however astonished the council when councilors further interrogated him on the financial queries and the previous resolutions of financial committee responding that he didn’t know the chairperson of the committee.
The statement angered the mayor His Worship Rev. Willy Kintu Muhanga who remarked; “I’m not ready to work with corrupt officials. Such officials with no ethical code of conduct and misusing people money should leave”.
Muhanga wondered how the treasurer denies knowledge of the finance chairperson and yet he received the invitation in addition to alleging earlier that he attended meetings to the end.
It’s at this point that a cornered Karamagi, decided to storm out of council after failing to answer to the financial queries.
Drama ensued when the speaker Kayondo Gilbert ordered the sergeant at arms to block him but the treasurer attempted to stone them. He picked stones from the court yard and started tossing them over councilors that had followed to arrest him.
The Speaker would later adjourn council for 20 minutes for sanity to return. Councilors including Joseph Ndamira, Joseph Rugamba and Mayor Kintu Willy Muhanga strongly condemned Karamagi’s conduct and recommended that he should be taken for medical examination to ascertain if he is insane.
Furthermore, the council resolved that the password for IPPS financial system be withdrawn from Karamagi before the Mayor ordered him to leave the municipality following his incompetence and misconduct.
During his campaigns, Rev. Muhanga vowed to fight corruption in Fort Portal Municipality so that the people can get better services but some technocrats have taken advantage of his quiet resolve to squander municipality resources.