We write to correct the many factual errors in the piece referred to above which was published in The Sunday Times of 9th November 2008. The article is full of inaccuracies and erroneous reporting that could tarnish the reputation of the employee concerned as well as negatively impact on the image of the RRA. Furthermore, the ill-advised cartoon on page 6 has compounded the inaccuracies in your article. First of all, Mr. UZARAMA, the person your piece claimed had resigned was available but was not contacted by The Sunday Times as would have been expected of a professional publication. Instead the journalist did contact an office messenger in RRA, who in the article has been “promoted” to the position of the personal secretary to Mr. UZARAMA, the person who supposedly resigned. On the other hand, the RRA Commissioner General, the Deputy Commissioner General and the RRA media spokesperson, all of whom on many occasions have been cooperative in providing information, not only to The New Times, but to the media in general, were all available but were not contacted by The Sunday Times. One wonders why in this particular case they were not contacted in the normal way. The person who supposedly resigned is in the office carrying out his duties as usual. If he had resigned he would not be executing his duties by and large and would not be at his desk. Secondly, the journalist got it wrong in regard to the procedures of RRA Senior Management members’ resignation. When a senior member of RRA resigns, he/she submits a resignation letter to the Chairman of the Board of Directors with a copy to the Commissioner General. But the journalist reported that UZARAMA’s resignation letter was submitted to his “immediate boss”, Commissioner Pierre Célestin BUMBAKARE, which is evidently wrong for persons who are familiar with the government employees’ statute. Thirdly, the writer claimed that Mr. UZARAMA was forced to resign due to the pressure that emerged after failing to account for the accumulation of his wealth that is beyond his earnings. We would like to inform the writer and The Sunday Times that RRA has never received any notification from the Office of the Ombudsman expressing concerns of any RRA employees who failed to account for their property. We remind readers that in The New Times issue of October 24th 2008, RRA reacted to an article claiming that RRA was on the list of institutions whose employees had failed to account for their wealth. We believed at that time that our article was clear enough, but even if it was not, the journalist ought to have contacted RRA for further clarification. However no effort was made. Normally we would not respond to such uninformed comments but out of respect for the readers of The New Times, we thought we should set the record straight. It would be far better if in future a detailed research and analysis was properly done to any facts before publication. Finally, Rwanda Revenue Authority is committed to providing quality services to all our partners, including the media and to avail any information that they may require. Gerald MukubuDirector, Taxpayer Services RRA
