Anti-Corruption Court on Wednesday morning convicted former principal accountant in the office of prime minister (OPM) Geoffrey Kazinda of abuse of office, embezzlement and causing financial loss of more than Shs316m to government of Uganda.
He was found guilty of syndicate in the court’s final judgement.
The presiding judge Lawrence Gidud has heard the case in recent years.
The court assessor, Ferrer Okech, has earlier asked court to acquit Kazinda of charges of abuse of office, embezzlement, causing financial loss of more than Shs316 million to government and diversion of public resources.
Kazinda is co-accused with Ms Beatrice Kezabu (assistant resettlement officer), who is also separately charged with false accounting; Ms Shamim Masembe, the proprietor of TOTAL fuel station in Ntinda, and businessman Hussein Katumwa, the station manager.
They are accused of submitting wrong accountabilities for fuel drawn from Caltex Ntinda Service Station now called TOTAL yet no fuel was consumed.
Kazinda and a clerk in the OPM Beatrice Keezabu were also convicted of embezzlement for using their positions to process its payment.
Masembe and Katumwa were found guilty of aiding the two government officials to steal public funds.
The trial judge Lawrence Gidudu cited satisfactory evidence against the accused convicting them on all the counts including Conspiracy to defraud, Embezzlement, fraudulent accounting, forgery and uttering false documents.
Kazinda was first convicted in June 2013 of forging the then OPM Permanent Secretary Pius Bigirimana’s signature and sentenced to five years which he has since completed.
He still has another case where he is charged with officials of the Finance Ministry for allegedly misappropriating Shs21billion of PRDP funds meant to rehabilitate the war torn Northern Uganda.
Kazinda in a rare showdown of misconduct forged his boss signature to defraud the ministry and went ahead to put Permanent Secretary Pius Bigirimana’s known clean track record into disrepute.