The Public Investment Management Centre of Excellence, under the College of Business and Management Sciences(CoBAMS), has concluded a two-weeks training on the Economic Analysis and Stakeholder Analysis Module. The training that has been going on in Jinja was closed by the Permanent Secretary and Secretary to Treasury, Mr. Ramathan Ggoobi. Mr Ggoobi, who addressed the participants on zoom said he was happy to see that the Makerere University under the PIM Centre of Excellence were involved in capacity building of the MoFPED technical staff as well as other people from different government departments. He hoped that this training will help address challenges that afflict many government projects.
“This country has over the years had major challenges regarding performance of projects including cost and time overruns, shoddy works, stalled projects, low absorption of borrowed funds among others. This majorly arose because of inadequate technical capacity among Government officials especially in undertaking cost benefit analysis and/or cost-effectiveness analysis for feasibility studies during project appraisal, but also poor implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of projects,” Mr. Ggoobi said.
He said technical officers were also found to have challenges in reviewing studies prepared by consultants including members of the Development Committee.
To this end, Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development in collaboration with the World Bank established the Public Investment Management (PIM) Center of Excellence at Makerere University with an objective of creating a critical mass of Public Investment Management experts within Programmes, Ministries, Departments and Agencies with skills in Project Appriasal, Execution, Monitoring and Evaluation.
The Permanent secretary pledged government’s commitment to funding the PIM Centre of Excellence in order to build a critical mass of experts in PIM across Government.
“We want the PIM Centre of Excellence to become a regional hub in training officials across Africa and beyond. Starting this FY (2022/23), the Ministry provided over 3 billion to undertake critical activities around capacity building and research and we shall continue to support the Centre to ensure achievement of desired results,” Mr Ggoobi said.
He said the government had directed that no project will be given access to the budget without completion and submission of the requisite feasibility studies.
In his remarks, the Principal of the College of Business and Management Sciences, Prof. Eria Hisali informed the participants that the college was in the process of starting a Masters program in Public Investment Management, a course that will benefit many technical persons in government and private firms.
He said he looked forward to see changes in management of government projects.
“What you have done is a technical and practical course. This means you have the opportunity to use the skills acquired. You also have the opportunity to gain confidence in what you are doing now. We invite you to work closely with the Centre and the other agencies of govt in addressing the challenges of PIM that we face,” Prof. Hisali remarked.
He encouraged the participants to work in groups so that they address challenges that policy makers face and provide solutions. “This is what the people of Uganda will be looking for as they invest their resources in this training”.
He reaffirmed the Centre’s commitment to conducting training and supporting PIM studies.
He also invited the participants to be part of the seminar series at COBAMS. “Let us aim at solving the challenges that we are facing as a community,” he concluded.
Dr. Willy Kagarura, the Manager of the Centre said the Centre would be training another set of technocrats from the MoFPED as it is the the mandate of the Center to build capacity in PIMS on a sustainable basis.
He congratulated the participants upon completion of the second module of the course, having done the first one earlier in the year.
The participants who were trained by staff from Makerere University PIM CoE and MoFPED together with Consultants from Cambridge Resources International (CRI) will be awarded certificates, following examinations that they sat at the end of the two weeks training in Economic and Stakeholder analyses, completes the Integrated Investment Appraisal Stage of the Program on Investment Appraisal and Risk Analysis (PIAR). Dr. Kagarura, a trainer himself, thanked the other trainers for a job well done.
PIM Center of Excellence Leadership
- Prof. Edward Bbaale – Principal Investigator (PI)
- Prof. Eria Hisali – Co-PI
- Dr. Willy Rwamparagi Kagarura – Manager