“We have a problem in Uganda”: the Dutch government may have been the victim of an extensive fraud case in Kampala. Grant money meant to support 20 Ugandan PhD students has apparently been siphoned off.

By Mark Schenkel, Kampala

A local university administrator in the capital Kampala is suspected of diverting 160,000 euros in Dutch donor money marked for Ugandan PhD students. The Netherlands Organisation for International Cooperation in Higher Education (NUFFIC) has launched an investigation.

Missing funding
The missing money formed part of 5.7 million euros in grants paid by the Dutch government since June 2007 to help support 20 PhD students.

The aim of the project, which involved University of Groningen, Radboud University Nijmegen and Eindhoven University of Technology, was to strengthen ICT training and research capacity in Uganda. The program ran until June last year.

Prime suspect
The prime suspect in the fraud case, according to the Daily Monitor newspaper, is Venansius Baryamureeba, the second-highest-ranked official at the University in Kampala. He had been tasked with coordinating the scholarship program disbursed through NUFFIC. He is said to have told the 20 students that from March 2008, they no longer had to pay tuition fees, even though NUFFIC provided the funds for them.

In an interview with the Daily Monitor, Baryamureeba denied the allegations of mismanaging donor funds. The money, he said, was well-used on a number of other projects.

Investigation launched
NUFFIC confirms that it has begun an investigation into what happened to the money. "We have a problem in Uganda," a spokesman confirmed. He added that it's too early to say what is actually going on. "We think we’ll be able to establish the facts, but it must be done carefully."

In response to an urgent request by the Dutch authorities, the Ugandan police have also started an investigation.

The Dutch Foreign Ministry provides most of the funds to NUFFIC. Out of a total of 151 million euros in program funding disbursed through NUFFIC in 2010, 107 million was allocated by the Foreign Ministry in The Hague. The rest mainly came from the Dutch Ministry of Education and the European Commission.