EASTERN PROVINCE

KAYONZA — The district has laid off 14 staff and merged several departments over financial constraints, The New Times has learnt.

Sources say the District Director of Education and the Human Resource Manager were last week given termination letters without prior notice.

Others who lost jobs includes 12 sector employees in charge of social affairs. "The district is not doing well financially due to poor internal revenue collection. It seemed impossible for the district to pay salaries for all the district employees, the only option the mayor had was to reduce on the number of staff to retain those the district can manage to pay," the source said. The source said the decision was approved by the District Advisory Council.

Some of the affected employees however, say that the decision was ill-conceived because sacking the entire 12 people in charge of social affairs will leave a gap. They also reason that certain unrelated departments were merged which may not enable the proper functioning.

For instance, the department of health, the source said, was merged with that of education.

The president of the district Advisory Council, Manasseh Gahima confirmed the development, saying the district has no financial capacity to pay all its employees.

It’s true the district Advisory Council backed the district proposal to sack all the sector officials in charge of social affairs. That department will be merged with that of civil status which currently is working perfectly," Gahima said by phone on Monday.

District authorities believe that merging departments and reducing staff will help cut expenses. The reduced workforce will translate into better and timely remuneration for the remaining staff, according to district officials.

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