KAARO KARUNGI | URN – At least 12 Councillors from four scattered island sub-counties of Buvuma have missed the swearing-in ceremony of the new district local government leaders due to lack of transport.
Buvuma district authorities merged the swearing-in ceremony of all elected local government leaders in the district and the sub-counties into one function held at the district headquarters in Kitamiro. The district has nine sub-counties.
The ceremony started with the swearing-in of all elected councillor, administered by the District Chief Administrative Officer Grandfield Oryono, and afterwards, the Chief Magistrate Juliet Hatanga presided over swearing-in ceremonies for the new district chairperson Adrian Ddungu and 24 councillors.
However, sub-county chairpersons have said that they failed to mobilize all their councillors to attend the function because they received late communication about the day’s activities and could not secure transport on time. The affected councillors are from the sub-counties of Lyabaana, Lwajje, Lubya and Bugaya.
Bashir Ssenfuma, the LCIII chairperson for Lyabaana sub-county says that four of his councillors did not have transport to move from the distant island to the sub-county headquarters, from where they would pick a boat to the district headquarters. It takes about seven hours to travel from Lyabaana Island to the district headquarters using an engine boat.
Anthony Okware, the Buvuma Town Council Chairperson observes a need to arrange such functions at the sub-county, to ensure that councillors are not disadvantaged.
The Buvuma District Principal Assistant Secretary Ismael Kabonge notes that it was inevitable to merge the ceremony due to a limited budget. He adds that it would be difficult for them to transport the required officials to the scattered sub county Islands for separate ceremonies.
