By Otim Nape
The IGG Lady Irene Mulyagonja has threatened to consider arresting BoU governor Emmanuel Mutebile if he continues defying her directives regarding the transfers and redeployment of staff that he occasioned at the central bank last month. Mulyagonja spoke on a city radio station and said the IG Act empowers her to issue warrants of arrest against supposed witnesses who ignore her summons or refuse to respond to queries when required to. But history surrounding Mutebile show that much as Mulyagonja isn’t a feeble IGG like her predecessors (Raphael Baku, Faith Mwondha & others) were, the elderly economist from Kabale has always been a hard nut to crack. And as such people who know him well, both in the official and unofficial capacity, say the man fears or respects only Museveni. But even Museveni, powerful as he is, has sometimes not be lucky enough to escape Mutebile’s public rebuke. His international media interview regarding the raiding of foreign reserves at BoU to exorbitantly purchase Russian fighter jets at a time the country wasn’t at war is indicative of the firmness with which Mutebile has acted even on matters that can clearly rattle the President. Even when things have somehow boomeranged and haven’t gone exactly as smoothly as he could have expected, the decision to act tough on Sudhir is further testimony of how daring and iron-fisted Mutebile can be. “He is naturally a very stubborn man who has been around long enough. You may fault him for many fallibilities but the man knows his stuff and can easily confuse you around it. And of course being in charge of the central bank and the independent-mindedness with which he has always acted since his days as PSST, creates an image of invincibility and indeed its only Museveni in this country that can eventually call him to order,” said one of the analysts we spoke to for this article. “The IGG being a seasoned lawyer and Judge will nicely quote all the well-sounding laws but this matter will be resolved politically and not so much basing on the law and along that plane, there is no way IGG can have a chance to prevail against Mutebile’s political connections.” Sources said that in his approach of taking-no-prisoners, Mutebile will and has always told off anyone and got away with it including Parliament. It will be recalled that during the Basajjabalaba city markets investigations (HB was compensated much more using government money than he was entitled to) the MPs in the 9th Parliament determined to get Mutebile firmly punished and even herd him out of the BoU building. “He was so discourteous in his approach to them and he indicated to them that however much they would grill him, Museveni was the man to have the last word regarding his fate,” recalled a Parliamentary watcher. In the end, the MPs who had created a euphoria in the whole population ended up ferrying ex-Finance Minister Syda Bbumba and ex-AG Kiddu Makubuya but elderly Mutebile (supposed to have authorized the movement of the money) defiantly stayed put at BoU and went ahead to even get a new contract despite the harsh Parliamentary condemnation. We are reliably informed that whereas his accusers to the IGG, led by Justina Bagyenda, are making a good case on the procedural matters they are raising, they won’t go very far (one wonders why they didn’t go to Court under Judicial Review) because guys whose outspokenness (if any) would have corroborated their case won’t publicly be speaking out any soon for the extreme respect (or fear?) they have for Mutebile. These are PSST Keith Muhakanizi and Deputy Governor Louis Kasekende who are the only governing board members that were validly in office at the time Mutebile is said to have improperly acted in a manner that bypassed the board. The other BOD members hadn’t yet assumed office. The law setting up BoU is so ironical (some have called it conservative) that the BoU governor, who is supposed to head the management and have his/her actions vetoed/supervised by the BOD, is by law the one who chairs that very BOD to which disgruntled staffers would ordinarily report or complain against him. This is why some MPs are determined to ride on the current crisis to demand sweeping reforms at BoU including change in both the BoU Act and the Financial Institutions Act.
M7’S AMBIVALENCE;
Museveni is quiet and will most likely not be speaking soon because he is understood to enjoy seeing his subordinates in government tear each other apart and they eventually run to him for a way out of the chaos they themselves fermented in the first place. The MPs, prudently led by Hon Katuntu, have vowed to intervene but this being Uganda by the time the appointed day for either of the feuding officials to appear falls, the matter would have escalated into court proceedings and this could be used as an excuse to shield the two officials (more especially Mutebile) from any kind of parliamentary scrutiny. Already Mutebile’s supporters, picking on a line from his much publicized 19th March letter, are already out painting IGG as an economic saboteur claiming that her insistence on probing Mutebile and the BoU management recent HR decisions could destabilize the economy. This is something Museveni too could in the end consider as justification to ask the IGG to back off ostensibly in the service of the bigger picture of things-which is the badly needed economic macro stability. It’s something Mutebile has already made reference to in his letter to Mulyagonja. Some unsolicited Mutebile supporters, like the loud-mouthed Andrew Mwenda (by the way this one has always had a borne to pick with the IGG) have already argued on social media that the IGG should spare the resources, that would be expended on Mutebile, so that she can conclusively investigate the more than 4000 complaints backlog lying in the inspectorate.
THICK SKINNED IGG;
But gratefully, Mulyagonja too has been around long enough to have developed the necessary thick skin enabling her withstand all manner of public criticism and condemnation. One would expect the army of Sudhir social media supporters to weigh in and make the difference but this is unlikely (they would rather be cautious) because they wouldn’t want to be seen defending Mutebile, a man whose incompetence as Central Bank CEO they previously told the world was responsible for the injustice that was visited upon their master Sudhir’s Crane Bank at the hands of Justina Bagyenda. Yet descending on Mutebile, while siding with IGG, wouldn’t be good strategy either as that would embolden Bagyenda a woman they (Sudhir fans) resent much more than her boss (the governor). All these delicate calculations leave the IGG in a clearly more complicated situation in as far as her wars with governor Mutebile are concerned. We shall regularly be publishing this Morning Briefing column whenever there are matters that, in our estimation, require profound insightful analysis for the benefit of our readers. For comments, call/text/whatsapp us on 0703164755!
