The Global Fund team, led by Mr. Linden Morrison, the Department Head, High Impact Africa 2, and Dr. Saman Zaman, the Senior Fund Portfolio Manager recently paid a courtesy call to the Ministry of Finance. The meeting was attended by Dowson Kalemba from the Global Fund’s Local Fund Agent (PwC), together with the FCU team that was led by Ag Coordinator, Paulo Kyama at the meeting that was held on 31st March, 2023 the Finance ministry headquarters in Kampala.
Mr. Morrison commended Uganda for being the first country in the region to submit their GC7 funding request. He however cautioned that there is a need to maintain focus on NFM 3 implementation so that good absorption levels are attained in order to prevent returning funds to the Global Fund.
He added that the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) audit is scheduled to start on May 8th, 2023. According to the Global Fund, as part of the planning phase, the OIG team intends to visit Uganda and hold meetings with identified stakeholders between 22nd- 26th May 2023 in country. The audit fieldwork is likely to start on June 12th, 2023, for a period of 5 weeks. Debrief meetings with all stakeholders are tentatively planned to take place between 13th-14th July 2023.
Mr. Morrison highlighted some of the focus areas as procurement and stock management, accountabilities. He said the FCU has a key role to play to ensure documentation is available and issues are resolved quickly during the inspection. The OIG inspection will cover all key Global Fund stakeholders.
The LLIN UCC 2023 was identified as a key activity for the year and the Global Fund team informed the meeting that the Minister of Health had committed a launch date of 25th April 2023 for the LLIN campaign.
Dr. Zaman noted that the Wave 1A of the LLIN UCC 2023 is bound to be a key focus area for the OIG inspection. He added that there is a need for the FCU to ensure effective oversight for the distribution of the LLINs.
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