By Mulengera Reporters
Since his arrest on 11th February 2023, Kampala water agent/vendor Umar Kato has been on trial in the Makindye-based Utilities Court specifically before Her Worship Gladys Kamasanyu. Information on the Court record shows that his case is one of the many H/W Kamasanyu has been hearing and state prosecutors from National Water & Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) have been able to produce evidence illustrated through testimonies of a total of 11 witnesses.
On Monday 22nd September, Kamasanyu announced that, having reviewed and considered all the evidence the prosecution had tendered, she had become convinced that the accused person has a case to answer.
This simply means that the defence has to commence on the process to bring evidence aimed at corroborating the presumed innocence of the accused person while rebutting the prosecution’s evidence. On Monday, Kato’s lawyers and relatives were in court and the accused person too. Gratefully, he is out on bail.
Briefly, the prosecution case is as follows: Kato was a NWSC vendor/agent authorized to operate in the Makindye slums area to enable the urban poor, who ordinarily can’t access safe water on their own, to have access to the same. NWSC uses this model, a PPP of some sort, to enable many would-be excluded urban poor people in Uganda’s urban areas to access clean and safe drinking water.
Each such vendor goes through a process of vetting at the conclusion of which they are assigned NWSC codes and token numbers which are the only way through which they get to key in and begin authorizing access to water by the urban poor at a fee.
After depositing or paying money in the bank in favour of NWSC, such vendor or agent turns up at any of the Corporation’s branch offices with his or her proof of payment, which is then used to mandate them to begin availing/selling water to the urban poor for and on behalf of the Corporation. The system is largely e-enabled.
But at the beginning of 2023, the system got hacked or breached and its operations halted everywhere as the NWSC IT teams worked around the clock to investigate and subsequently ensure restoration of the service. As all customers and users waited for the hacking problem to be resolved and service restored, intelligence information emerged that some vendors or agents were continuing to operate normally without being affected by the presumed hacking.
It turned out that some vendors continued operating and making money which would never reach NWSC coffers because officially, the system was down and not operating anywhere. The Corporation leadership engaged Police and other security agencies-and investigations were commenced resulting into the harvesting of Umar Kato who was the brains behind the hacking problem, which the Corporation hadn’t promptly detected and accepted as such.
The original thinking was that there was genuine disruption or breakdown in the system which required fixing. In the process, a loss of more than Shs400m was occasioned onto the Corporation. And the liability for all this is now resting on the head and shoulders of Umar Kato who is supposed to have worked with others still at large.
As of February 2023, an operation was undertaken to investigate and get to the root of the problem, culminating into the apprehension and arrest of Umar Kato who was caught red handed busy operating the system and selling water to the urban poor in the Mutungo-Bina-Luzira neighbourhood-albeit behind the back of NWSC’s staff.
This act of transacting, selling water and making money at a time no one was officially believed to be operating, caused Kato to be charged with unauthorized access & electronic fraud contrary to sections of the Computer Misuse Act-and also with theft which is an offence under the Penal Code Act.
It was ironical that someone authorized to serve as NWSC agent or vendor in charge of the Makindye area was found operating in Mutungo/Bina which is in Nakawa division, which had never been assigned to him. During the Monday morning Court session, Kamasanyu proclaimed that prosecution had adduced significant evidence meaning that a prima farcie case had been made out requiring Umar Kato, the accused person, to defend himself.
If found guilty and convicted on all the three counts, Umar Kato risks receiving a jail sentence of between 5 and 10 years. His defence lawyers indicated to Court they would be ready to commence on his defence on Monday 3rd October. The Magistrate agreed with them and set that exact date as the day when the hearing of the case resumes at the Makindye-based Standards, Utilities & Wildlife Court. (For comments on this story, get back to us on 0705579994 [WhatsApp line], 0779411734 & 041 4674611 or email us at mulengeranews@gmail.com).
