By Mike Sebalu
The Ministry of Public Service has made a draft of proposals for Cabinet consideration to standardise funeral and burial expenses for notable Ugandans citing unending difficulties in conducting state and official burials.
Under the proposals, it will cost up to Shs500m to bury a sitting president. The proposals further suggest that government would spend Shs300m on burial expenses for the vice president, former vice president, speaker/deputy, chief justice/deputy, and eligible judicial and accountability honchos including the IGG.
The proposed funeral cost of senior and junior ministers, leader of opposition as well as the prime minister/ex who die while in office is Shs240m.
In the blueprint titled “Uganda Funeral Management Policy 2022”, government seeks to stop a haemorrhage of public resources through inflated state and official burial arrangements.
The state minister for Public Service, Mary Mugasa says the government has not been having budgetary caps for state burials and in the process, a lot of money was lost without proper accountability.
