In an effort to strengthen the Human Resource management function in the Government Ministries, departments and Agencies. The spirit of quarterly meetings is in high gear, that is every after three months. It involves all heads of Human Resource management function across the MDAs civil service.
The objective of these meetings is to share knowledge and experience in the implementation of Human Resource Policies, practices, and procedure and provide on spot guidance to Human Resource (HR) challenges in the course of executing their duties.
The Commissioner Human Resource Management and Policy Sharifa Buzeki called for respect of the HROs norms and ethics since the integrity fiber has been endangered. . Buzeki underscored the importance of being prudent and equipped with laws and policies during this time when the ministry is fully decentralizing pensions. She noted reports indicate HROs officers implicated in the corruption scam in the processing of pensions and benefits to retirees in government.
Other participants observed that whereas HROs have been allegedly implicated in the corruption scam of pension and benefits processing there was need to appreciate the challenges of the Local Government structures and suggest mitigation measures to improve them. A case in point was the Kabarole district where all staff involved in pension and gratuity processing were suspended and another team put in place to handle the schedules as a mitigation measure which is a short term mitigation.
The other mitigation measures were recommended that in order to recover the lost image there was need to bring together all the common cadre staff under one roof to be easily managed and controlled. The Commissioner Human Resource Management Health Sam Opio Okiror was quoted saying that there is no “HRO who is born corrupt’, instead this function need to be supported with adequate resources allocation to enable them execute their mandate and also they are only surrounded with a forest of evils, he emphasized
1. The root cause of corruption should be addressed and some of the HRO are still new in service and they want to get reach soon that is why they are tempted to do so.
2. There should be transparency in processing of Pension and gratuity for staff retiring and the moment one puts in his letter of retirement, the HR should embark on retirement plan and by the time the officer vacates office , all his/her payment will be ready.
3. There should be teamwork between HR and Registry staff who are custodian of information, but you find Registry staff are not consulted for opening of Pension files for staff due to retire.