It all started on March 13, 2017, when Justice Kabanda’s driver Akantorana Matiya and bodyguard Jimmy Eyou lodged written complaint to the IGG, accusing their boss of subjecting them to economic exploitation whereby she signed for and picked their allowances but never passed on the money.
Just UGX630,000 it is. A teardrop in the ocean any day. But to High Court judge Elizabeth Kabanda Kibula, this is more than just a few wads of cash in question: her reputation has been brought into disrepute.
Judge Kabanda has been directed by the Inspector General of Government (IGG) to refund a total of UGX630,000, part of which money was meant for upcountry travel allowance for her former bodyguard and driver that she did not remit to them.
That Kabanda is a judge who should be living the creed she professes but finds herself in such a quagmire is one irony, but the mother of it all is her jurisdiction–the criminal division.
nder inquiry file number HQT/128/07/2017, IGG Irene Mulyagonja commenced investigations into allegations that Justice Kabanda, of the High Court’s Criminal Division cheated her driver and bodyguard of their allowances.
It all started on March 13, 2017, when Justice Kabanda’s driver Akantorana Matiya and bodyguard Jimmy Eyou lodged written complaint to the IGG, accusing their boss of subjecting them to economic exploitation whereby she signed for and picked their allowances but never passed on the money.
The money was part of the UGX29 million the Judiciary gave to Kabanda as facilitation for Mpigi High Court criminal session that commenced on September 18, 2016.
The duo claimed that they were entitled to a daily allowance of UGX90,000 for 40 days, which comes to a total of UGX3.6 million, but Justice Kabanda paid them for only 30 days yet the money was given to her by the Judiciary
In her February 23, 2018 probe report, the second Deputy IGG, Mariam Wangadya, breaks down the monies that Justice Kabanda is supposed to refund.
Having completed her work, the IGG forwarded the report to Justice Benjamin Kabiito, of the Judicial Service Commission, urging him to take appropriate disciplinary actions against Justice Kabanda and other officials implicated, including Mpigi High Court Accounts Assistant Geoffrey Jjagwe–who has been ordered to refund UGX3 million.
The IGG also recommended severe disciplinary action against Jjagwe for forging accountabilities regarding money he purports to have paid to the driver and bodyguard whose signatures were forged and money diverted on their behalf during Justice Kabanda’s criminal session period in Mpigi.
The report shows that Mpigi High Court Registrar Jolly Shwanda Nkore (on whose Stanbic Bank account number the UGX29.9 million was deposited on August 25, 2016) implicated Kabanda by confessing that “these funds were spent under the guidance of Justice Kabanda.