Merry christimas & prosperous new year 2013

Kasese girl braves labour pains to sit PLE exams

By Thembo Kahungu

Posted  Monday, November 5  2012 at  19:37

A primary seven candidate at Kasanga primary school, Bwera sub-county, Kasese District on Monday had to endure labour pains as she sat for Primary Leaving Examinations.

"The pregnant girl developed labour pains in the middle of the first paper – Mathematics – this morning and was rushed to hospital but did not deliver,” the Kasese District Education Officer, George Mayinja, told this newspaper.

He says she later returned and sat for the afternoon Social Studies exam in the same condition.

Mr Mayinja commended the girl for being brave.

He says the district did not face any major challenges on the first day of the examinations, save for the poor roads in the mountainous sub-counties which affected the delivery of examination papers on time.

Kasese Municipality Education Officer, Lawrence Tiruganya, said that about 20 candidates, mostly girls, have missed the examinations due to pregnancy.

However, he said that the parents are to blame in such cases because UNEB rules do not stop pregnant candidates from sitting the examinations.

About 9708 candidates registered for PLE, which started nationwide today, in rural Kasese, while 2503 registered in Kasese Municipality.

editorial@ug.nationmedia.com

Accessed from Daily Monitor on Tuesday 6 Nov. 2012 from: http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/Kasese+girl+braves+labour+pains+to+sit+two+PLE+exams/-/688334/1612428/-/61imw6/-/index.html

NAADS: Sh2b sent to personal accounts

 By SOLOMON ARINAITWE & DEAR JEANNE

Posted  Saturday, November 3  2012 at  02:00

KAMPALA

An internal audit report into the operations of the National Agricultural Advisory Services has exposed gross mismanagement, wasteful expenditure and unaccounted for funds at the government agency charged with modernising rural agriculture.

The report comes at a time government is still reeling from grand corruption at the Office of the Prime Minister amid donors freezing aid to the country.

In a scam with the hallmarks of the OPM scandal, the report established “that several officers were advanced money totaling over Shs1.9b to implement project related activities which remained unaccounted for at the time of audit. [However] The Treasury Accounting Instructions under paragraph 215 to 217 requires officers to account for money advanced to them within 60 days from the date of payment”.

By the time the audit report was printed, Ministry of Agriculture had not responded to the audit queries. Our efforts to reach them by press time were unsuccessful. But it also emerged through the audit that the ministry commissioned Avian and Human Influenza Project designed to start four years “effective 1st July 2008 and ending on 30th June 2012 did not happen as the Project commencement delayed by two years and only began operations in June 2010 when the first disbursement of funds by the donor was received”

“The risk of delay to start the project leads to government incurring commitment fees for the period the funds were not used. The delayed implementation may lead to failure to procure some items as the costs keep going up due to inflation,” the report adds.

Under the project, despite designing a work plan which called for identification and support of five high risk districts vulnerable to the poultry and human influenza virus, there was no report showing that this exercise had taken place. However, the report adds that “a review of expenditure indicated that more than Shs25m was advanced for this activity,”

Perhaps, showing the dire consequences that may arise out of the botched project, the report casts a grim picture on the “intended objectives of strengthening national preparedness and response to threat of both the highly pathogenic Avian influenza in poultry and human pandemic influenza in human beings.”

However, though the report notes that a “number of motor vehicles and motorcycles were given to officials to help in the implementation of project activities. To the contrary, it was noted that the District chairmen and CAOs would always use project vehicles for activities unrelated to the project,”

Under the Avian and Human Influenza Project, Quarantine centres and checkpoints to avoid uncontrolled movement of livestock. However, the centres have not been developed except “an old structure in Kasese District that was built by Kasese [Local Government] as a quarantine centre which was not being used since it was abandoned several years back”.
However, despite the low absorption rate, the government continued injecting money in the project.

By July 2012, disbursement received was only $3m out of the planned $10m. “With the impending closure of the project, there is a risk that all the money will not be released but the government continues to incur commitment fees,” the report notes.

Employers of the project were remitting PAYE and Withholding Tax were being deducted by the project, with no evidence that the taxes were received by URA. In another damning expose, the report reveals that government vehicles were driven by [private] garage owners.

“On several occasions this vehicle has been seen packed at night at places that do not portray a good image for the ministry. There was no record to show that the Ministry has asked the garage owner to return this vehicle. There is a likelihood that this vehicle could be lost or number plates changed in favour of the garage owner,” the report says.

editorial@ug.nationmedia.com

accessed on Saturday 3 Nov. 2012 from: http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/NAADS++Sh2b+sent+to+personal+accounts/-/688334/1610008/-/5y88pyz/-/index.html

Uganda@50, School Debates

                                                    The chairperson listening critically to the audience

                                           The audience listening to one of the speakers of the day

                                                 The best four posing for a photo with the Gifts

                                               The speaker who took it all,he talked good English.
                                                            "For God and my Country"

Information for Empowerment

BIC  is a community information centre located in Kasese district that has supported 19 primary schools in opening up school gardens. To the join the rest of the school children mark the Uganda@50, BIC and the sub county local governments in Bukonzo County, invested in school debate compititions to promote public speach, self confidence and esteem within the pupils. The debate attracked many pupils at school level, some presents were given to the best pupils to encourage them and their parents.

By BIC
Field team- Isongoma, Zeverio and Makanica

BIC in ICT class

“ICT” THE  WAY TO  GO

ICT use has of recent been widely embraced by most Ugandans where at least each average working Ugandan owns  a computer, phone, and of recent internet modems are becoming a trend. This shows how fast Uganda is developing in terms of technology. ICT is taking a steady trend of improving people’s lives especially communication and information sharing.

Of recent something has caught my eye; which is the use of web2.0 which is commonly associated with web applications that facilitate interactive information sharing, interoperability, user-centered design, and collaboration on the World Wide Web. These tools  include web-based communities, hosted services, web applications, video-sharing sites, wikis, flickr, blogs, mashups, and folksonomies, social-networking sites like face book, twitter, RSS, wikis, Skype and  blogs which are  hosted for free for example one can acquire a blog using www.wordpress.com , www.blogger.com and all these are free sites. One can get a blog designed for information sharing with the outside world.

At least every Ugandan who has access to the internet is using one of these web 2.0tools. To many, face book has been a darling and that’s the first page to be logged in to once in office or a café. I have not widely used face book but I embraced Skype and adapted to it faster. Skype has so many features that I find interesting like making calls. I no longer use my phone to call any of my Skype friends I simply press the “call button” and off we go, unlimited minutes and that’s PC to PC calls. When it comes to PC to phone calls one has to buy Skype credit. I can share videos, photos, files in a matter of seconds with office colleagues or other friends in distant places and also hold group discussions. Even a lot of topical issues are discussed on these sites meaning that we are going the “E”style, everything is becoming defined by the “E”:-   E-governance, E-society, E-commerce, E-banking and so much more.

At times am taken back to the world of “imagination” where I would no longer need to move an inch to buy credit (Airtime) to make calls since I will buy it online with Skype, not getting on a bus or to the posta to deliver an envelope since I will either use e-mail or one of the web 2.0 tools to send it, I will no longer travel to Kampala for meetings but will be held via video conferencing, I will no longer visit the shopping malls but simply place my orders and they are delivered on my door step. For now this may seem a dream to most of us but the rate at which ICT is being embraced in Uganda, it will no longer be a dream but a reality since most of these are already in place and in use.

Internet  speed in Uganda has not been fast enough but with the laying of the fibre optic cable, the speed will greatly increase. And most ISPs have put it to themselves to increase their bandwidth due to the increased internet demand and with this am certain Uganda will get to THE  level of the western world in the use of ICT tools.

So let we,  as Ugandans embrace ICT wholly and “our world” will not be still of imagination but a reality.

And indeed the world is becoming a “Global village”. Let’s be part of the village.

By

Isingoma Geoffrey

IT Officer BIC

 

BIC staff attending to progressive farmers enhancing them with ICT skills

IT the way to go.

Isingoma Geoffrey

IT Officer