Joshua Nahamya
28 February 2025
Mbarara City –Bonny Tashobya Karutsya, the speaker of Mbarara City Council has asked the government to conduct a special investigation into Generating Growth Opportunities and Productivity for Women Enterprises [RROW] money.
The GROW project is a government of Uganda initiative worth US$217 million [approximately Shs 800 million] funded by the World Bank and implemented by the Ministry of Gender, Labour, and Social Development in partnership with the Ministry of Finance under the Private Sector Foundation.
A significant loan initiative was launched in August 2024 aimed at increasing access to entrepreneurial services that will enable female entrepreneurs to grow their enterprises for both small and medium women enterprises in refugee host communities.
Ever since the project was launched in 2024, it has received mixed reactions from the public where most people think it is for the rich while others say that they have not received any money from the project.
According to Karutsya, a fund implemented by the project Development objectives] PDO] to respond to the needs of women entrepreneurs who want to grow their businesses, sustain their self-employment, and create jobs in Mbarara has been nicknamed an elephant project.
He said that instead of enabling female entrepreneurs to grow their enterprises, it has made them poor whereby many have lost their time and money applying for money in banks which they have not received.
“We know that the government disbursed this money in banks but according to a survey in Mbarara here no woman has so far benefited from the said fund” added that it has a lot of issues that need to be investigated,” Karutsya noted
He said that the women embraced it and were showing interest in receiving this money for development but they are disappointed by the government for failing to implement this project.
“Women are fidgeting registering and getting all the credentials requested but for almost a year now no woman in Mbarara has received any money from the grow programme,” he noted
Karutsya added “When you go to the villages women are crying that the government gave them money which they don’t know where it is. So we are asking ourselves as leaders of Mbarara City, who is responsible for this money? Who are the people that received GROW money and how much was received?”
Unlike other government programs aimed at getting people out of poverty, Karutsya said that leaders were not involved in the GROW project which he alleged that opportunists took advantage to steal the said fund at inception.
“Whenever such government programmes come, we are inducted about how the programme will be implemented but with GROW project we just hear that women received money neither was the LC I chairpersons engaged about this programme,” he said
“Even our focal persons are not aware about this money yet they are the implementers of the programme.” Karutsya noted
Amina Nakku, a Senior Labour Officer in Mbarara City confirmed that as implementers of the GROW project, there is already a gap between her office and the bank managers where GROW money was sent for easy accessibility.
“We have 6 commercial banks where this money was sent for easy manageable and accessibility, but whenever I go to the bank managers to get a report about how many beneficiaries and how much they received, I am often denied information which poses a lot of questions that whether this project exists or its air,” Nakku said.
She added that even her top bosses at the ministry have no answers for the GROW project. “They only tell us how the project is moving on smoothly but on the ground we don’t see anything moving yet women demand a lot from us as the project implementers” so it is a question of investigation,” Nakku explained.
She also said that some banks have taken advantage of using the GROW fund and sold it as part of the bank products.
“A story I got from some women is that whenever a person applies for GROW funds it is alleged that they instead convince her to take their loan products at a high interest rate claiming that GROW money is difficult to access” This means that in some banks GROW money is used to recapitalize their liquidity preference where the government should come in to crack this fraud,” Nakku explained.
She suggested that the government should ensure that a rappel is created between the labor officers and the banks to ensure that this project becomes a success.
“On Monday I will go with the chairperson of the women’s league we ask the managers to show us the list of people who have so far benefited” otherwise we are worried this money might not be in those banks” they are just disguising and playing around with the women’s efforts.” Nakku noted
Sam Muganda, Assistant Resident City Commissioner Mbarara City North warned that he will report the matter to the president for further follow-up.
“Good enough the president is coming here let us tell him the truth so that we can always help people to benefit from this program aimed at getting women from poverty. It is very unfortunate to ask women whether they received the Grow money but the answer we are getting is that no woman in this city has benefited” We are asking who are the people that received the GROW money,” Muganda said
“We need to know which banks received this money. How much did they receive? How many people so far received that grow money? Who are the beneficiaries? And even know those that come here complaining that they applied and were told that the money is not there yet we know that the government released the money.” He noted
Meanwhile, the Assistant RCC warned to re-arrest Mbarara City commercial officers who stole Emyooga funds.
These include James Agaba and his junior Donanti Mutahi who were cleared by high court Mbarara after facing an interdiction for stealing Emyooga money meant for the boda-bodas and another for the city leaders.
“I here that you want to reinstate some of your staff members that were interdicted because we know the law compels you to reinstate them after completing their 6 months of interdiction please do so that they don’t sue you to get more money from you but be rest assured that for us as security we shall re-arrest them for stealing Shs 30mln for boda-bodas and Shs 50mln for the leaders because we still have their exhibits with us at police.” Muganda noted
