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Latest coming in from Najjera and Nansana is that the two suburbs are seeking city status in a bid to show their might and prove their glory.

Najjera in particular is seeking city status because their level of madness exceeds the normal levels experienced in other Ugandan suburbs. “We have the most serious block parties. We have the highest number of Subarus. We have all the slayqueens. Why can’t we be a city? We have more apartments in Najjera than Mbarara or even Jinja,” argued one of the Najjera residents.

Nansana on the other hand thinks it’s high time the country puts a respect on their name. “Can you believe we are the only place in Uganda with a capital city. The capital city of Nansana is Ku Masitoowa. We deserve city status,” Mukiibi argued while munching on Axil pork. “We even have the best pork joint in the country. Anyone who has tasted Axil pork will confess that nothing comes close to it in this country,” he added.

For the first time, Nansana and Najjera will be collaborating on something. “Together we are signing a petition and delivering it to the Speaker of Parliament. If Fort Portal can be a city. Then surely Nansana and Najjera too should be cities. Nansana and Najjera lives matter,” said a member of this Nansana Najjera coalition.

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Yesterday, we shared a story of how Makerere Professor Tickodri chased the original ideator of the Kiira EV car from the Project. Today, we have learned that the Kayoola Bus was never manufactured in Uganda as earlier reported.

The much hyped solar-bus made in Uganda was never made here, but in China. BigEye.ug has learned that the Kiira team used the funds to contact a supplier in China to send them a bus which they would later re-brand to ‘Kayoola’ and claim that it was manufactured in Uganda.

The team at Kiira Motors used this link: https://cv-export.com/electric/electric-cat/bus-electric/chtc-htk6711gbev-electric-city-bus-408.html to order two buses from China. They would then proceed to change the logos and tags on the buses to reflect ‘Kayoola.’ Nothing about this bus ever got manufactured in the country.

All the specifications laid out about this Chinese bus would later turn out to be the same features that were exhibited by the Kiira team.

BigEye.ug has learned that the original Kiira EV team was dismantled when the funds came in, leaving Musaazi to bring in his new team, without the context and ingenuity of the original team. The question is; why would a whole country be taken for a ride? Why did such a great project turn out to be a shadow of its former past?

To Be continued…

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By Staff Writer

Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) has suspended a programme airing on Urban TV after several viewers complained about its content that was deemed offensive and scandalous.

Although the Commission has since learnt from social media that the programme Scoop on Scoop is currently off air, the regulatory due process, which was already in motion, continues. UCC first received complaints about Scoop on Scoop in May 2020, and accordingly wrote to Vision Group on May 25, 2020, seeking an explanation, including information on the qualifications of the staff behind it.

However, Vision Group didn’t comply as directed, prompting the UCC Ag. Executive Director Irene Kaggwa Sewankambo to suspend the programme as investigations commence.

In her letter of May 25, 2020, Ms Kaggwa Sewankambo said the Commission had received complaints to the effect that the content and nature of Scoop on Scoop airing on Urban TV violates the Minimum Broadcasting Standards as enshrined in the Uganda Communications Act 2013. The complainants had explicitly alleged that during the month of May 2020, Scoop on Scoop featured content that was “abusive, demeaning and inciting; opinionated and not attributed to any reliable source.”

Accordingly, the Commission initiated investigations in accordance with sections 5(1)(b), (x) and (j), 31 and 45 of the Uganda Communications Act 2013. To facilitate the investigations, Urban TV was asked to submit a written representation in response to the complaints, and to submit recordings of the programme for the period May 1 – 20, 2020.

Urban TV was also to provide proof of certification and registration of the producer and the host of the programme, in accordance with sections 5 and 27 of the Press and Journalist Act, Cap. 105.

In response, Vision Group wrote to the Commission on May 29, 2020, stating that the complaint had been forwarded to its Human Resource Department for disciplinary proceedings. Vision Group enclosed DVDs of the programme, but neither made representations on the complaint as requested nor provided evidence of the producer and the host’s qualifications.

“Once the process is completed we shall advise on the outcome,” the Vision Group letter stated.

Consequently, and following further complaints about the same programme, the Commission decided to act. In her letter of June 30, 2020, to Vision Group, the UCC Executive Director pointed out that Urban TV had not complied with the Commission’s directives.

“The Commission notes with concern that other than generally stating that Urban TV had subjected the said complaint to your internal processes, your response of May 29, 2020, did not comply with the Commission’s directives as indicated in the letter of May 25,” the Executive Director wrote.

Ms Kaggwa Sewankambo further noted that in addition to not complying with the Commission’s directives, the TV station had continued to air the same programme, in the same manner, leading to other complaints, including one dated June 24, 2020, from M/s Balondemu & Co. Advocates.

In their complaint, Balondemu & Co. Advocates alleged that Urban TV had in the past three weeks used Scoop on Scoop to broadcast “false, offensive, scandalous and harmful content” against their clients Ali Marcus Moses Sempija and Ms Sheila G. Gashumba.

The programme is to remain suspended until Urban TV has satisfactorily demonstrated to the Commission that Scoop on Scoop “has sufficient controls to avoid the risk of breaching the Minimum Broadcasting Standards and the rights of other members of the public.”

Besides, the TV station is required to comply with the Commission’s directives issued earlier on May 25, 2020, and to submit recordings of the programme for the period between June 1-26, 2020.

The UCC Executive Director warned that Urban TV risks “other appropriate regulatory sanctions” if the station doesn’t adhere to the aforesaid directives. Sanctions available to the Commission in the event of failure to comply include suspension of the station’s broadcasting license.

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Makerere University is no stranger to controversy, this time round, it’s about a group of Professors who stole a final year project from one of their students. It was a case of a supervisor taking over the brain work of one of their students and claiming it as their own. Put simply, it’s the biggest idea theft in the history of modern Uganda.

But how did it all start? It all started in 2011 when a young Makerere University student, Steven Jeremy Ntambi approached his lecturer to commercialize his dream of a Ugandan made electric vehicle. Ntambi approached Professor Sandy Stevens Tickodri-Togboa and shared his idea that had been in the pipeline since 2008/9.

In 2009, Ntambi had graduated from Makerere University with a first class degree in Electrical Engineering. https://www.newvision.co.ug/news/1251842/ntambi-leads-makerere-team-generation-car By then, Ntambi had also led a group of eleven students to building Uganda’s first ever environment friendly and most cost-effective vehicle. It was heralded as the next generation car.

The car was presented in Italy at the World Design Exposition. After the expo, President Museveni then offered to fund this project all the way to commercial manufacturing. It’s here that Prof. Tickodri came back in the picture despite having scoffed at the project earlier.

“During the work Paul Isaac Musasizi always scoffed at the project and mentioned that it was impossible, and I was being too ambitious…during the time we worked I was labeled a fraud and always threatened to remember he supervised my final project as a student. After we had the project delivered in Italy with global teams, Museveni agreed to support this project. And immediately Professor Tickodri and Paul Isaac Musaazi claimed to have had this dream,” Ntambi narrates.

Upon his return from Italy, Ntambi reached out to Professor Tickodri who had then met the President and taken over the project and the funds. Musaazi would go on to install himself as the CEO of Kiira Motor Corporation. It is at this point also that Professor Tickodri vehemently warned Ntambi off the project and warned him never to set foot anywhere close to this electric vehicle. As they say, the rest is history.

It turns out, that the Professor and Paul used the opportunity when Ntambi was pursuing his masters to carry out a coup d’etat. They presented themselves to the president as the ideators of this grand project. Ntambi would be sidelined as just another former student that had worked under them.

To be continued…