Conflicting beneficiary registers have stalled the disbursement of compensation funds to traders whose merchandise was ruined during the Nakivubo drainage channel flooding.
The Prime Minister, Rt Hon. Robinah Nabbanja, disclosed the setback on Thursday during the Prime Minister’s Question Time in Parliament.
Prime Minister Nabbanja explained that inter-agency coordination failed after stakeholder institutions submitted sharply contradictory figures.
“We constituted a team comprising of Uganda Revenue Authority (URA), Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) and Kampala City Traders Association (KACITA). This team agreed to come up with the list of beneficiaries, but each had their own list,” said Nabbanja.
URA submitted a verification roll of 360 claimants, while KCCA and KACITA listed 460 and 480 affected traders, respectively.
The lack of consensus prevented the Ministry of Finance from releasing the bailout funds before the close of the 2025/2026 financial year.
“We wanted to start paying them in May but the traders petitioned the President again. As a result, the financial year in which they were to be paid ended and money was not sent to the Office of the Prime Minister because it lacked a list of beneficiaries,” Nabbanja said.
Following the impasse, a verification audit conducted by the Internal Security Organisation (ISO) identified 737 legitimate claimants.
The Prime Minister noted that the Office of the Prime Minister now awaits executive guidance from President Yoweri Museveni before commencing payouts.
Budadiri County East MP, Hon. Julius Nakiyi, raised the matter on the floor of Parliament, demanding clarity on the whereabouts of the Shs20 billion relief package pledged by the President.
The compensation covers financial losses suffered when heavy runoff burst the Nakivubo channel in October 2025, submerging commercial buildings and trade arcades in downtown Kampala.
Speaker Jacob Marksons Oboth criticized the persistent inflation and manipulation of victim rosters, warning that such irregularities continually derail public compensation initiatives.
