President Museveni has appointed ,the former managing Director of DFCU Bank, Mathias Katamba as the new board chairperson of the Uganda National Oil Company ( UNOC), replacing businessman Emmanuel Katongole.
In a letter addressed to the speaker of Parliament ,Hon. Anita Annet Among dated March 5th ,2024, the president designated Mathias Katamba and other five members for vetting.
He will serve alongside Justine Isenyi, who currently works in the vice president’s office; Moses Kabanda, the acting commissioner for public administration at the Ministry of Finance; Herbert Mugizi, a principal engineer at the Ministry of Energy; Dr. Iva Lule, a chemical engineer; and Zulika Mirembe, a lawyer.
UNOC, a limited liability company owned by the Government of Uganda, is charged with handling Uganda’s commercial interests in the petroleum sector and ensuring that the resource is exploited sustainably.
This comes a few days, after it was revealed that President Yoweri Museveni was set to drop some board members at UNOC after over irregularities in recruitment of key personnel by the board.
According to sources, Museveni was irritated by the way the board led by Emmanuel Katongole whose four year – two terms expired last month allegedly tried to recruit senior manager who had no qualification for the position the agency had advertised.
It is said UNOC placed adverts for the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO) which many respondents responded to and as all these was ongoing, the Chief Executive Officer of UNOC was on leave. However, what surprised many at UNOC was that one of their colleagues who is also a daughter to a minister in government was handed the job amidst resistance from the Human Resources department head.
Who is Mathias Katamba the new UNOC Chairperson
Mathias Katamba is a Ugandan economist, business executive, banker and entrepreneur. He is the managing director and chief executive officer of DFCU Bank, the second-largest commercial bank in Uganda, effective January 2019.
Before that, he was the managing director and chief executive officer of Housing Finance Bank, a commercial bank, co-owned by the Ugandan government and the National Social Security Fund (Uganda), a semi-autonomous retirement pension organisation for non-government employees in Uganda
