Minister Evelyn Anite proposes major salary cuts for MPs

Anite expressed her surprise upon learning the amount of money MPs were receiving when she first joined parliament at the age of 24
She believes that reducing the salary incentive will attract only people willing to serve the public
She started investing the money into profitable ventures, leading to the establishment of factories and a large hotel in Northern Uganda

This, she believes, will make the job less attractive to what she termed as “greedy businessmen.”

Hon Anite, a former Member of Parliament for Koboko Municipality in the 9th and 10th parliaments said on Monday that the legislative job has of late become attractive to greedy people who don't have people’s interests at heart.

As such, she said, if the government reduced the salary incentive, Parliament would attract only people willing to serve.

“Money is the nectar that attracts all these businesspeople to parliament,” she said.

“If you cut the pay, then we shall start to have MPs that come to serve.”

Read: Minister Anite to join anti-corruption march to parliament

State Minister for Investment and Privatisation Hon Evelyn Anite pulse uganda

Big surprise

The Minister was speaking in light of the ongoing backlash that the 11th Parliament continues to face over back-to-back allegations of corruption and misuse of public funds.

Anite recounted how she was very surprised when she first joined parliament at the age of 24, to learn how much money the MPs were receiving.

At the time, she had been working at the Uganda Media Center, where she was making less than a million a month.

Upon joining the house, she says she was stunned to receive Shs 28 million as her first salary.

“I called my husband and I did not know what to do with all this money,” she said.

But coming from a family of business people, Anite says she quickly started investing the money into profitable ventures, which was how she ended up building factories and one of the biggest hotels in Northern Uganda.