By Spy Uganda
Kampala: Few years back, TheSpy Uganda learnt that the Electoral Commission (EC) headquarters on Jinja-road in Kampala are up for demolition in June 2021 to pave way for the Kampala flyover project.
READ ALSO: Uganda To Compensate Contractor Ugshs300M Per Day For Kampala Fly Over Delays
The government in partnership with Japan will construct the flyovers at Clock Tower and Kitgum House, widen Mukwano Road and Queens’s Way.
As a result therefore, EC officials asked for Sh72b to relocate to a new home after the roads authority (UNRA) warning that failure to vacate within the agreed time would leave taxpayers incurring Shs300m daily in fines to the contractor due to delayed acquisition.
For example, in 2019 the delay of the first phase attracted a fine of shs 1.8 billion monthly to the contractor.
However, as we report this, no development has yet been implemented something that has put the project on the probability of suffering a stillbirth. TheSpy Uganda has learnt that Electoral Commission’s (EC) failure to relocate to a new home comes after they reportedly received compensation from Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) through the donor, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
”The delay has stalled UNRA’s process of identifying a contractor. We can’t even award a contract to the contractor because what will the contractor do when there is no land,” said a top official at UNRA who expressed discontent with EC.
He added; “EC was supposed to leave that place before elections. But because they begged us that they had challenges, we gave them up to the end of elections.”
A source at EC said the top management has engineered the delay following a mega-fight arising from who procurement of the warehouse.
“What is causing the delay is consensus. Commissioners are fighting with the technocrats. The fight is who wins the deal. It is a mess at EC,” an official who begged not to be named for fear of losing his job said.
In fact, it is said by insider sources that EC has rejected many bidders who were not willing to offer kickback hence halting the entire process. “So what they did, they resorted to head-hunting but so far those brought on board have been rejected because the commissioners are not agreeing to share the money.”
