By Jimmy Muhumza
Parliament
Ministry of Trade’s Engineer Doe Byaruhanga has faced a hard time before MPs on the parliamentary Committee of Trade, Tourism and Industry to explain the types of vehicles that consumed Shs .400 million in fuel to transport the ministry’s documents from Kampala to Entebbe.
Parliament allocated shs 6.8 billion to the Ministry of Trade to relocate from farmer’s houses in search of space due to the increased number of workers but later the ministry headed by the permanent secretary Geraldine Sssali diverted this to the renovation of the same building.
The MPs questioned how could shs 400 million used to transport the ministry’s documents from Kampala to its stores in Ntebe which is less than 50 kilometers.
Engineer Doe Byaruhanga, who appeared before the parliamentary Trade committee, told MPs that he used shs .2 million each round to transport these documents but when MPs grilled him more he told them that he used 80m per round
He also shocked members of parliament when he told them that he does not know the owner of the company and the type of vehicle used to transport the documents yet he is the one who contracted the same company.
 Eng. Byaruhanga said that he does not even remember the exact type of vehicles used and no contract or agreement was reached in writing.
He also told MPs that the ministry extended a fuel card to the owners of the vehicles that transported the documents to Entebbe which left members of the committee questioning how this was done when they had no contract with the vehicle owners.
However, the committee learned that Eng. Byarugaba exchanged the Ministry of Trade fuel with one of the fuel station pump attendants in this fraudulent act
This prompted the committee chairperson who is also Mbarara City south MP Mwine Mpaka to hand him over to parliament CID officers for further interrogation and investigation.
The committee is set to meet the three ministers of the trade ministry to interface on the same matter as they compile the report for parliament
