Tourism Ministry on Spot over shs13Bn MTV Africa Music Awards, Parliament Orders Investigations

The Ministry of Tourism is on the spot over Shs13Bn paid for Uganda to host the flopped 2020 MTV Africa Music Awards (MAMA), that were later cancelled over public backlash that Government wanted to use the awards to try whitewash Uganda’s image at international scene.

The Auditor General revealed that the Ministry of Tourism, signed an agreement with a foreign company on 5th February 2020 to enable Uganda host the 2020 edition of MTV Africa Music Awards (MAMA) which events were slated for 13th June 2020 & Government agreed to a sponsorship fee of Shs13Bn, that was paid in two instalments of UGX10.4Bn that was paid on 12th March 2020 and another Shs2.6Bn paid on 19th January 2021.

Parliament got to learn that due to COVID 19 & heightened electoral season, the awards were cancelled & Uganda was only meant to be paid Shs3.2Bn out of the Shs13Bn it had paid from the organisers, but the government has failed to recover the funds, thus prompting MPs to demand for probe into this deal.

“It is unfortunate that up to now, there hasn’t been any accountability on the expenditure of the UGX13Bn. We want to find ways of whipping the accounting officers who expended this money. We are going to call for a thorough investigation into this matter and into what happened to this money and we demand that the people responsible for this expenditure must be investigated and whipped,” Hon Balimwezo Nsubuga the Nakawa East representative said.