The Makerere Staff Appeals Tribunal was yesterday forced to cancel the proceedings after the university failed to produce minutes, which were recorded during meetings that led to the sacking of 45 staff members at the end of last year.
According to yesterday’s program, the Tribunal chaired by Senior Advocate George Omunyokol was scheduled to hear appeals by Associate professor Peter Neema-Abooki, Dr Olive Darlia Buhule and Dr John Mushomi Atwebembeire, which were all cancelled.
After hearing from the lawyers Isaac Ssemakadde representing Associate Prof. Neema and Anthony Wameli Yeboah representing Dr Mushomi, the tribunal was forced to postpone the proceedings to 7th March after the lawyers revealed that they could not ably represent their clients without the minutes of the mentioned meetings.
Omunyokol tasked Lawrence Sanyu, a manager in charge of Records and Information in the Directorate of Human Resources of the university to explain why the minutes had not been produced before the tribunal.
Sanyu told the tribunal that he sits on the Appointments Board as part of its secretariat by virtue of his office before he denied knowledge of the minutes in question. Sanyu added that he did not attend the said meetings and he has no knowledge about the minutes.
Sanyu confused the tribunal officials when he contradicted himself minutes later as he disclosed that the minutes were awaiting approval by the Board, which is scheduled to hold its next sitting in two weeks.
The tribunal headed by Omunyokol therefore resolved to adjourn the matter to March 7, 2019 before directing the two parties to be ready ahead of the next appeal proceedings.
