PAC Grills Gender Ministry On 'GROW Project' Mismanaging, Corruption Allegations

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) grilled the Ministry of Gender on the Generating Growth Opportunities and Productivity for Women Enterprises (GROW) Project.

 The comes at the time when recently, the Committee expressed interest in meeting officials from World Bank and Ministry of Finance after discovering that the largest portion of the US$217M (UGX806.860Bn) fund will go towards administering the Fund, while little money is left to directly benefit the women entrepreneurs.

Agrey David Kibenge,the Permanent Secretary of  Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development informed the Committee that funds for the GROW project were given to Government as a grant from World Bank and the project is targeting women entrepreneurs who already have established businesses but is looking for affordable capital to grow their business and the implementation started in January 2024 and expected to end in 31st December 2027.

“Unfortunately, because of the overwhelming demand to support women, GROW has continuously been dragged to pick every woman which from the word go, the World Bank said no. which Government of Uganda through the Ministry of Finance that negotiated this also agreed to that we pick the women entrepreneurs meaning that GROW will be implemented countrywide, it is the modality of accessing that money which determines, which woman,” said Kibenge.

Hon.Sarah Opendi the Tororo Districk Woman Representative wondered why the GROW project has a component to construct markets yet there are several markets that have been constructed by Government and remain empty.

 “We are aware that Government has constructed a number of markets in those districts and there are challenges in those markets, I want you to go and interest yourself, look at the upper floors, they are being utilized the minimum. This is money meant to support women, there are women who would need market, but you want to construct space for others, how are you going to sustain that? Are those women going to occupy those premises and going to occupy them freely? Are they not going to pay?''.She Asked.

Alex Asiimwe, a Commissioner Labour, Industrial Relations and Productivity, at the Ministry of Gender, revealed that out of the US$128M that is going to be managed by the Ministry of Gender, US$42Mn (UGX156,166,500,000) would be spent on training the women entrepreneurs, while US$49M (UGX 182,194,250,000) will go towards establishing necessary infrastructure like the construction and equipping a multi-purpose facility, and US$35M (UGX 130,138,750,000) is the credit facility that will go to the women.

Hon Xavier Kyooma Legislator for Ibanda North warned that the GROW project if implemented in its current format is likely to affect women’s productivity because many will spend so much time chasing for money, they may never end up getting, and wondered why interest is going to be charged yet the project isn’t being operated like a revolving fund.

“Women don’t have any component that involves direct injection even the one for microfinance support through competition, so what happens to the one that isn’t successful? Meaning the women will be diverted from their routine activities to competition. This is a project what the President would say is full of cham cham (eating) because I want to assure you that this project implementation will affect the productivity of our women they will try to move up and down, running looking for money which they will not get,” said Kyooma.

This also comes after the non government organization called Public Square called for an inquiry into the GROW Project citing Lack of clarity in Performance, Transparency and corruption allegations, Access Barriers and bureaucratic hurdles among other issue.