TOP FINANCE MINISTRY OFFICIAL FIRED FOR STEALING GOV’T SAND

By Our Reporters

Hamza Galiwango has been rendered jobless after police several times caught him rend-handed in the act of illegally extracting sand and murram in the Namanve Industrial Park. Details under CRB/010/2018, a criminal file reference, show that Hamza Galiwango the Director for Industrial Parks Development at Uganda Investment Authority (UIA which is part of the Finance Ministry) was arrested and detained for several days over stealing sand and murram in the Park until he was released on police bond. Mulengera news website has seen a number of criminal investigation reports delivered to KMP Commandant ACP Frank Mwesigwa implicating Galiwango of not only orchestrating theft and illegal sand-mining in the Park but also of criminal interference ordering police to release the excavators and other heavy trucks impounded on the crime scene. One of the reports was written by Namanve OC Station ASP Justus Niyonzima. On the 2nd page the report shows: “The main illegal activities in Namanve remain murram excavation and sand mining. It’s surrounded by a poor community who see Namanve Industrial Park as their source of living. The main perpetrators remain Madyaba, Sempala and Mukalazi being the main dealers of murram in the Park. More often if the above mentioned persons are arrested, they claim to have been authorized by UIA Director Lands & Parks Development Mr. Hamza Galiwango and when we contact him over the same, he confirms that he is aware of them and that we leave them.” Niyonzima adds that even other top UIA officials based at Namanve do nothing to stop illegal sand mining because they fear Hamza Galiwango WHO is among the top five officials at UIA. He says each time police arrests such people UIA officials frustrate police investigations until the thugs are released for lack of a complainant who should ordinarily be UIA the owner of the Park on behalf of GoU. Another police report shows that using his office, Hamza Galiwango allocated himself land in the Southern Estate Part of the Park where sand mining and murram excavation goes on openly. That in the Southern estate alone, the man owns three murram excavation sites from which he monthly reaps hundreds of millions. That Galiwango’s sand is openly transported from the swampy areas of the Park and nothing happens since the resident UIA officials that should have blown the whistle are his accomplices and it’s through him that they must report to the UIA top management. Before enumerating the particulars of the trucks that are used in illegal sand mining and transportation to serve Galiwango’s interests, the police’s other report also faults Galiwango for authorizing illegal agricultural activities in the Park for personal gain.

THE TRUCKS:
The police report further shows that Galiwango has a stake in a company called HALAL HOLDINGS which owns some of the excavators responsible for illegal murram and sand extraction to the detriment of the environmental wellbeing of the Namanve Park. Some of the Isuzu Trucks involved in these unauthorized activities (for which Police holds Galiwango responsible) are particularized as follows: green UAS 988T, blue UAS 019E, UAR 537H, black UAK 439X, UAS 918U, green UAN 781D, blue UAS 243G, UAG 454C, UAJ 638N, UAE 419N, green UAZ 705E, UAJ 188H & white UAM 254C. Police detectives have since established contact with URSB to establish the other people with whom Hamza Galiwango co-owns HALAL Holdings. The police report shows that having gotten tired of reporting to disinterested UIA bosses working under Hamza Galiwango, the local people in the areas of Namiryango bordering the Park resorted to becoming extortionists themselves. That every person they would catch returning with his or her truck from participating in the illegal sand transactions would be made to pay a fine of Shs300,000 so that they aren’t reported to police. The report shows that these locals, who have since become wealthy through this daily extortion, are led by a one Sarah who has since become a known notorious beneficiary from illegal sand mining activities in the Mukono-Seeta area. That the area LCI officials are also beneficiaries as they have always been aiding Hamza Galiwango to threaten local police bosses who try to impound Isuzu Trucks involved in the above impugned illegal activities. “These illegal transactions have been going on with the blessing of UIA staff deployed in KIBP,” the report stresses. Police recommends a validation exercise during which ownership of all vacant plots in the Park can be reviewed to establish the extent to which Galiwango and other UIA staff connived to own plots by proxy or by creating ghost owners on the UIA Land allocation lists. Police also recommends immediate transfer of all UIA staff currently employed in the Namanve office and that they should eventually be prosecuted.

2ND POLICE REPORT:
In a separate report, Kiira Divisional Police CID officer Mulema Maliserino reveals that Sarah Nassimbwa, who is deployed to oversee the entire Park’s security, is the other top UIA official closely working with Galiwango to protect illegal sand miners in Namanve. Mulema names members of the notorious sand mining gang as Enock Sekitoleko Madiaba and his other accomplices Sseseko and Rogers Namara, a UIA Namanve office cleaner, who has become very wealthy by being Hamza Galiwango’s eyes and ears on the ground. The matter of UIA officials illegally mining sand in the Park has since reached the President on whose prompting the IGP Gen Kale Kayihura recently constituted a team of police officers to comprehensively investigate the matter and have Galiwango and other culprits criminally prosecuted for occasioning such loss to their employer the GoU. The police team comprises of Mukono DPC Rogers Seguya, Kiira Division CIID Officer Mulema Maliserino and scene of crime officers like Ibra Batasi and Ibrahim Maate. Panic intensified recently as well as fears that more UIA bosses could be apprehended when the police investigations squad raided Galiwango’s home and that of Sarah Nassimbwa where a search was conducted and evidential exhibits recovered. The investigations are being coordinated from an office at Bweyogerere police station.

GALIWANGO FIRED:
The shocking embarrassment the scandal risks bringing to the Finance Ministry recently prompted the UIA governing board to convene an urgent meeting during which it was resolved that the long serving and wealthy Director Land & Industrial Parks Development Hamza Galiwango be relieved of his duties. Indeed in a phone interview with Mulengera news website, Galiwango confirmed being on interdiction. “All that you have heard and are sharing with me right now is true and I’m indeed home and not working but unfortunately I can’t discuss that matter beyond that because investigations are ongoing,” is all Hamza Galiwango said and hang up. To comment on this & other Mulengera news stories, reach us on 0703164755!