55 Groups in Moroto Cleared for Emyooga Program

At least 55 groups from Moroto District have been cleared to access financial support under Emyooga program.

The groups, which received about 1.9 Billion Shillings in May have not been able to access the resources due to failure by the district to organize capacity building on financial literacy for association leaders.

The impasse left the groups unable to access their finances until the area MPs offered to finance training the group members.

According to the District Commercial Officer, Lawrence Achia, the groups that include carpenters, salon operators, local leaders, journalists, fishermen and Boda Boda riders among others, could not access the money because the district could not facilitate the training.  He, however, says the groups are ready to access the money since mandatory training has been conducted.

The MPs jointly agreed to support the training such that the group members can implement the government program. They resolved while monitoring the implementation of Emyooga funds last month in which they heard that the district had no resources to train the group leaders.

Earlier, there was suspicion among association members that the leaders were planning to give the money to ghost groups instead of the registered group associations.

Achia confirmed that each of the groups has received 30 million except the leaders' associations which have received 50 million shillings each. There are three leaders’ associations in the district.

Achia calls on the group members to come up with business plans, which is one of the guidelines for a group member to get Emyooga.

The Resident District Commissioner for Moroto Asanasio Kaisa says the members should ensure that the money is used for its intended purpose such that the loans are recovered. He stressed the need for the associations to ensure that they use the loan to uplift their living standards and economic welfare.

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In the Karamoja sub-region, four of the nine districts have so far implemented emyooga program. They include, Abim, Napak, Kotido and Karenga.

In Karenga, some groups were disqualified when a vetting committee led by the RDC Samuel Mpimbaza Hashaka discovered that alleged group members could not name their association nor any member or its executive.