The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Gulu, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Residents of Gulu district have expressed concern over late reporting to work and the wastage of resources by civil servants who still commute far away from their workplaces.
Apart from commuting from far, the residents have observed that most health workers across the different health facilities report to work extremely late at midday, work for a few hours and even leave before 5:00pm.
In July 2020, councillors voted Awach town council located approximately 50km, north of Gulu City to host the district headquarters after the then Gulu municipality was elevated to a city. However since then, the majority of leaders and technical staff have commuted to work from the city.
For instance, the Resident District Commissioner Stephen Odong Latek, the district chairperson Christopher Atekere, Chief Administrative Officer Sonny Mulembe, and District Health Officer including line secretaries all operate from Gulu city offices.
James Okwera, a resident of Labworomor in Palaro sub-county says the absence of technical staff who should closely supervise their subordinates in the district has left civil servants to abscond from work, report late with impunity.
Irene Lamwaka Aziz, the female youth councilor for Palaro sub county says that during her monitoring visit to the health centre on Monday, there were no health workers at the facility.
Phoebe Ayoo Obol, the woman councilor for Patiko and Owor sub-counties, who also doubles as the district speaker noted that the under staffing has also created an imbalance in service delivery coupled by lack of infrastructure for the staff.
Sonny Mulembe, the Chief Administrative Officer admitted that the performance of the district has declined. He says that they are strategically planning to revamp the efforts of the staff to improve service delivery.
Since March, Gulu has also been operated without the District Service Commission, which is charged with the responsibility of recruitment, promotion, disciplining and terminating all errant employees.
In August this year, the Local Government Management of Service Performance Assessment for Financial Year 2020/2021 by the Office of the Prime Minister ranked Gulu below average in all service delivery sectors. It focused on transparency and accountability, performance reporting and performance improvement, management and supervision services and service delivery results among others.
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