Councillors of Kahama District in Shinyanga Region have recommended aggressive EPA style approach in recovering the misappropriated 78m/- initially meant for the establishment of a community bank in the area.
Pressure from residents through their councillors pushing for recovery of the money missing from financial records gained momentum at a joint meeting yesterday between the visiting Deputy Minister, Prime Minister`s Office, Regional Administration and Local Governments, Aggrey Mwanri and the local leaders, who sought intervention by higher authorities.
As the deputy minister took time to listen to administrative challenges facing the local leadership in Kahama, one of the councillors, Leonida Nyangusu Ouko, spoke of the difficulty encountered when they go around mobilising the general public to make their contributions to promote community development projects.
``At the moment the major obstacle is the mysterious disappearance of 78m/- collected from the people in 2005 for the establishment of a community bank in Kahama.
Now the regional administration has required us to face the people again to convince them to contribute for a similar project for the region. People are not ready to contribute unless the money is returned,`` Leonida clarified.
The councillors commended government efforts to recover the money stolen from the Bank of Tanzania`s External Payment Arrears (EPA) account insisting that similar efforts should be employed to have the contributed money returned before anything else.
The remarks by Leonida, who is also the district chairperson of UWT received overwhelming support from the Member of Parliament of Kahama, James Lembeli, who requested higher authorities to help find out how the money was spent and to have disciplinary measures taken against all culprits.
Lembeli volunteered to share information with regard to identification of people responsible for the misappropriation of 78m/- collected for the proposed community bank in Kahama.
``People were mobilised to buy shares but the whole project ended in a fiasco,`` Lembeli complained.
For his part, minister Mwanri pledged in-depth investigation of the matter to make sure that all implicated in the scam were taken for questioning and that the money was returned.
Earlier this month during a full council meeting councillors from the area demanded explanation from Kahama District Council director Theresia Mahongo on the related financial records.
The director denied any knowledge of the community bank project, adding that when assuming office from her predecessor, she was not notified about it and there were no records whatsoever of the project.
Of late, Shinyanga Regional Commissioner (rtd) Gen, Dr Yohana Balele had issued instructions to councillors in all districts in the region to reach the residents to raise funds for the establishment of a regional community bank.
* SOURCE: Guardian
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