By our reporter
Deputy Speaker of Parliament Jacob Oulanyah has defended himself against allegations that he tried to block the audit and investigation into the operations of Bank of Uganda (BoU).
Recently Oulanyah came under spot after a section of MPs accused of him of trying to block the investigations, claiming it could amount to sub judice since there are pending court cases involving the central bank and other banks.
However, on Tuesday the Deputy Speaker told Parliament that the motion to investigate BoU was only deferred because of concerns that proceedings of the committee would offend the sub judice rule.
“The motion was presented and debate started. The main thing came from a letter from lawyers that there are five cases filed in court on the same facts as contained in the motion and they raised the issue of sub judice under our rule 72. We could not continue debating the matter because they could prejudice the proceedings in court,” he said.
He said he has no problem with the audit and that he was not over ruled by Speaker Rebecca Kadaga as some media houses claim.
“My ruling was captured by the Speaker but the headlines continue to say the speaker overruled the deputy speaker. That is misleading,” noted Oulanyah.
The Auditor General recently kicked off audit into Bank of Uganda looking for irregularities in the way several banks were sold off. BoU Deputy Governor Louis Kasekende had tried to block the audit citing sub judice as the Crane Bank matter was before court, but Kadaga ruled that any government body can be subjected to an audit.
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