Bribes at the president’s door

It was an unusually candid moment for Uganda’s long-serving president.

Speaking at State House last weekend, Yoweri Museveni did what leaders of his stature rarely do: admit, without euphemism, that corruption has seeped into the very walls of his own office.

“Corruption has even reached the State House,” he said, his voice laced with frustration. “People were paying up to Shs 30 million just to make sure I see a letter.”

The confession was more than political theatre. It was a crack in the official narrative, a rare glimpse into a government machinery the president himself described as “dead, clogged with parasites.”

A ROT AT THE TOP

According to Museveni, the scam worked like this: ordinary Ugandans, some desperate for help, others seeking influence, were paying middlemen inside State House to ensure their petitions reached the president.

In some cases, he admitted, the letters did reach him, and he acted on them. But the real transaction had already happened behind closed doors, where access to the head of state had been quietly commodified.

Several suspects have since been arrested, he said, but his broader message was damning: the system he presides over is not merely flawed, it is compromised at its core. Those words echo the country’s anti-corruption statistics.

The Inspectorate of Government estimates Uganda loses Shs 10 trillion annually to graft. The 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index places Uganda 140th out of 180 countries, with a score of just 26 out of 100.

Behind those numbers lie delayed infrastructure projects, broken hospitals, underfunded schools and an eroded public trust so deep that, as Museveni himself recounted, whistleblowers by-passed local security officers altogether, choosing instead to pass sensitive information to his daughters.

“THE SYSTEM IS DEAD”

The president’s story was both strange and telling. “Corruption has even reached State House. People were paying up to Shs 30 million just to ensure I saw a letter. It’s true, when I did see it, I would respond and provide a solution, and then the person who delivered the letter would be paid here at State House,” Museveni said.

He added that several individuals involved in the scheme have since been arrested.

“Those offices of yours are dead, clogged with parasites. But I have many ears; I don’t rely on just one person. Eventually, we get the information because the NRM is a benevolent group, not a vicious one. Some of those who do wrong eventually question them- selves and come forward to confess.”

In July, he said, whistleblowers refused to approach GISOs (Gombolola/ sub-county Internal Security Officers) and DISOs (District Internal Security Officers) they no longer trusted.

Instead, they found Marcella Karekye, his daughter and a State House communications aide. She, in turn, went to Natasha Karugire, his eldest daughter.

“People had information but couldn’t find anyone trustworthy at your level. They didn’t trust the GISO or DISO. So, they looked for my daughter, imagine! They found Marcella Karekye and told her. She’s one of my daughters involved in the media, and they thought she might know Museveni,” he said.

Karekye is the special presidential assistant in charge of Communications and Director of the Government Citizens Interaction Centre, and biological daughter of James Tumusiime of Fountain Publishers. Museveni clarified that while Karekye works at State House, she does not have direct or regular access to him.

“So, what does she do? She goes to Natasha Karugire, my eldest daughter. Natasha then became the Director General of Intelligence because the system is dead, filled with rotten people. So, Natasha is the one who told me,” he said recently.

It wasn’t always supposed to be this way. In 2018, frustrated with the Inspectorate of Government, Museveni created the State House Anti-Corruption Unit. Reporting directly to him, it was meant to be a fast, decisive weapon against graft.

Yet, years later, no one has been prosecuted for taking bribes to facilitate access to the president, including the very schemes he described last weekend.

CRITICS: “HE BUILT THIS SYSTEM”

To some of Museveni’s fiercest critics, the president’s admission was less about bravery and more about political convenience.

“Museveni has built a corruption enterprise,” said Godber Tumushabe, assistant director of the Great Lakes Institute for Strategic Studies.

“They rig everything: the rules, the process, the voting, even the outcomes. That’s how he governs. This is not just about stealing money, it’s about rigging the entire system to serve one man and his party.”

For Tumushabe, the president’s lamentations ring hollow. “He is the superintendent of this corruption. He can’t dismantle it without dismantling the system that keeps him in power.”

Veteran political analyst Peter Walubiri was blunter still.

“He presides over a government built on corruption. Without it, his regime cannot survive. Sometimes Museveni only speaks the truth by accident.” Walubiri accused the president of using bribery himself, to sway MPs, to fracture opposition parties, to secure loyalty in public procurement deals.

“Fighting corruption would be political suicide for him,” he said.

SUPPORTERS SEE A FIRST STEP

Inside the ruling party, the reaction was different. Emmanuel Dombo, the NRM’s director of Information and Publicity, framed corruption as a universal human flaw rather than a political design.

“Even Jesus was betrayed for money,” he said. “This is not unique to Uganda or the NRM. It’s human nature, and only strong laws and enforcement can restrain it. Dombo praised the president’s recent arrests as “a good first step” and urged police to follow through so that “others can learn from it.”

For anti-corruption campaigners, the president’s words are confirmation of what Ugandans already know: corruption has become the cost of doing business with the state, whether that’s renewing a licence, registering land, or, getting the president to read your letter.

“Corruption is so pervasive that it’s nearly impossible to access any public service without paying a bribe,” said Marlon Agaba, executive director of the Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda.

“If even State House is compromised, what hope is there for the rest of the system?” Agaba called Museveni’s statement an “admission of failure,” noting that as head of state, he receives regular intelligence briefings and cannot credibly claim surprise.

Beyond the politics, the rot Museveni described has a human price. Each bribe taken is a school left without textbooks, a rural clinic without medicine, a road left half-finished. Shs 10 trillion lost annually could build hospitals, equip classrooms, and electrify villages, but instead, it fuels a shadow economy that rewards connections over competence.

The president’s admission may have shocked some, but for ordinary Ugandans, it was merely a public acknowledgement of a truth they have long lived with: the state is something you must pay to access.

MORE OF THE SAME

The question now is whether Museveni’s bluntness signals real change or yet another round of rhetoric. His record invites skepticism. Before every election, he promises a crackdown, warns “thieves” their time is up, and yet the prosecutions rarely reach the top.

Critics say that’s by design. “The system he runs is inherently corrupt,” said Tumushabe. “He cannot expect anything different from it.” If the president is serious, reform will require more than arrests.

It will mean dismantling patronage networks, protecting whistleblowers, empowering independent institutions, and ensuring that those closest to power face the same justice as those furthest from it.

For now, Ugandans are left with the president’s own words, “the system is dead” — and the uneasy knowledge that the rot he described is not confined to State House, but stretches through ministries, districts and the smallest village councils. Whether those words mark the start of an honest clean-up or the latest chapter in a long cycle of outrage and inaction will soon be clear.

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