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Don’t worry about ghost refugees – Besigye

Kiiza Besigye

Opposition’s Dr. Kiiza Besigye has called upon the general public not to worry about the ongoing refugee crisis scandals.

Besigye made this comment via his twitter handle where he said that its not a shock that a number of ghost refugees have been registered by the office of prime minister.

He that’s the trend of operation in the entire ruling National Resistance Movement regime where everything is fake beginning from the government its self.

“GHOST”- schools, teachers, students, soldiers etc is a well known feature of the NRM Junta! Why the fuss about “ghost refugees” by EU?” Besigye posted.

This comment follows the information by the European Union after opening investigations into allegations of corruption in refugee assistance programmes in Uganda where the head of European Union delegation in Uganda confirmed that it has formally submitted the case to the EU’s anti-fraud office (OLAF) for investigation.

OLAF investigates a wide range of wrongdoings from embezzlement, fraudulent claims and misconduct in public procurement procedures, to customs fraud. It also helps the authorities responsible for managing EU funds inside and outside the EU to understand fraud types, trends, threats and risks, and to protect the EU’s financial interests by preventing fraud of all kinds.

There are allegations that officials at the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) have been swindling money meant for refugees operations in Uganda.

Complaints also indicate that OPM officials in connivance with aid workers have been inflating refugee figures in order to attract more aid which is then corruptly shared. The allegations were reportedly raised by South Sudan refugees to UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, while on a visit to Uganda last week.

The EU statement says the allegations were brought immediately to the attention of the government of Uganda.

The statement says the UNHCR and the World Food Programme have duly informed the EU about the allegations. It says the EU has been coordinating closely with the aid agencies and other donors with the OPM to get a clear understanding of what it calls “these troubling allegations”.

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