By Mulengera Reporters
Sometime back, a whistle blower dragged Twebaze Bemanya (in his capacity as Liquidator or Official Receiver of UEB in liquidation) to the IGG claiming the man from Kanungu was on the verge of curiously paying out Shs6.7bn to controversial Kampala law firm Kagumire Advocates as legal fees. The whistle blower claimed this was excessive, outrageous and also referred to the events of Tuesday 3rd November 2020 as proof that Bemanya was involved in having some soft spot for the said law firm.
On that day, representatives of the law firm drove to URSB headquarters at Georgina House where Bemanya (who has since relocated to ARIPO) used to be officed. In his complaint to the IGG, the whistle blower also criticized URSB Director in charge of insolvency & receivership Mustapher Ntale demanding that his conduct equally be inquired into.
Trouble started when Bemanya, as the official receiver or liquidator for UEB, conducted successful negotiations to agree on the unpaid terminal benefits that were due to hundreds of former UEB employees. The Bemanya settlement aimed at diminishing UEB in liquidation’s financial liability or obligation which stood at over Shs56,607,456,800 (in unpaid terminal benefits).
The ex-employees’ representatives signed up to a compromise document whose contents were later disputed by a faction of some members who protested the same in court. Led by Dison Okumu, Edward Rubanga, JH Ndawula, James Nataala, Stephen Mukasa, Fredrick J Mubiru, Joseph Mutatiina, Oyela Rose Eve Opiro, Mary Wacha, Stephen Apilu and others, the aggrieved ex-UEB employees sued under Civil Suit No. 49 of 2014 accusing the liquidator of acting improperly.
Fortunately or unfortunately, their litigation was unsuccessful, case was dismissed and huge costs were awarded against them both in High Court and Court of Appeal. The Bemanya-supervised UEB in liquidation was represented by the Kagumire Advocates who at the end of the day demanded being paid Shs6.7bn as legal fees and other costs they incurred as they went about defending the suit the Dison Okumus had instituted against the entity. In his petition to the IGG, the whistle blower demanded that the IGG inquires into Bemanya and Ntale to understand why they weren’t vigorously objecting to such an outrageous bill in legal fees.
The whistle blower also wondered why the entity would be taken advantage of to pay so much money when there was actually no prior agreement stipulating what the instruction fees for the lawyers would be in the first place. Actually, unbothered by the whistle blower’s noise, the Kagumire firm bosses on 27th August 2020 wrote to the official receiver demanding immediate payment of their Shs6,735,373,102 as professional fees and disbursement amounts. To the whistle blower, all this was indicative of a precarious situation that would sooner or later lead to the GoU losing so much money in curious legal fees to the Kagumire Advocates who were clearly very unrepentant about their huge claim against UEB. The whistle blower demanded that the IGG takes keen interest by inquiring into the way Bemanya had generally conducted business relating to the UEB liquidation.
Mulengera News has seen a two page document (with 6 points) in which Deputy IGG George Nathan Bamugemereire speaks about the insistence by the whistle blower that the Inspectorate inquires into Bemanya’s conduct of all the affairs relating to UEB in liquidation. Indeed, Bemanya has since been required to explain himself in writing to the IGG and Mulengera News has seen copies of his written statement in which he shields himself against the whistle blower allegations.
Bemanya explains, seemingly to the IGG’s satisfaction, that the 3rd November meeting wasn’t a dubious activity but an attempt by him to speak to the Kagumire lawyers regarding their Shs6.7bn claim in unpaid professional fees. That, having considered the Shs6.7bn claim extremely unfounded and unrealistic, Bemanya used that same meeting to cajole the Kagumire law firm representatives to accept a mere Shs90m as their professional fees.
“Our proposal was rejected and no agreement was arrived at in this meeting,” Bemanya asserts showing readiness to elaborate more while defending himself against the whistle blower allegations should the IGG require him to. For reasons Mulengera News couldn’t readily establish, Bemanya sent a copy of his personal statement to the President through the same being furnished to the office of PPS Dr. Kenneth Olusegun Omona. The Kagumire lawyers maintain that they deserve the Shs6.7bn on grounds that the suit which they successfully defended (on behalf of UEB) related to a subject matter or claim of Shs56.6bn. That the entity survived having to lose so much because of their expertise which was successfully deployed against Dison Okumu & others.(For comments on this story, call, text or whatsapp us on 0705579994, 0779411734, 0200900416 or email us at mulengera2040@gmail.com).