SUMMARY: Kiira Motors Corporation or KMC is a State Enterprise in Uganda established to champion the Development of the Domestic Automotive Value Chain for job and wealth creation.
New documents leaked by a whistle-blower to several media outlets appear to list the details of how Kiira Motors Corporation, the “makers of Kiira EV buses locally known as Kayoola duped President Museveni large sums of money in fake bus scam.
Emerging details according to the credible documents have indicated that Kayoola Bus was never manufactured in Uganda but rather it was imported from China and “was later rebranded”.
The documents also reveal that the project was controversially stolen from former students by a Makerere University Professor, identified as Prof. Sandy Stevens Tickodri -Togboa.
Leaked documents also reveal that Kiira Motors Corporation used the funds to contact a supplier in China to send them a bus which they would later re-brand to ‘Kayoola’ claim that it was manufactured in Uganda.
The list allegedly shows details of an order of two buses by Kiira Motors Corporation from China. A link is attached by this publication. Click here for details.
They would, according to documents proceed to change the logos and tags on the buses to reflect ‘Kayoola.’ “Nothing about this bus ever got manufactured in the country (Uganda), the documents indicated.
“All the specifications laid out about this Chinese bus would later turn out to be the same features that were exhibited by the Kiira Motors Corporation,” the document adds.
Kiira Motors Corporation or KMC is a State Enterprise in Uganda established to champion the Development of the Domestic Automotive Value Chain for job and wealth creation. The Equity Partners are Government of Uganda represented by the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation holding 96% of the initial stock and Makerere University holding 4.
In his twitter accusation, Mr. Ntambi said; “You see people who simply got a student project and now turned it into a corporation by simply running with your dream and now receiving support from the state.”
However, according to records at Makerere University, Ntambi’s final year thesis report titled was Vehicle Design Summit’s Vision 200- Design of the Power Electronics, and it was centered on the design and development of a converter for the auxiliary power unit and its control strategy.
This is just a portion of the entire vehicle assembly and doesn’t necessarily mean that Mr. Ntambi was the source of the idea for the Kiira Motor’s Corporation plant.
In fact, other sources reveal that the idea came from the head of state President Yoweri Museveni when he requested a team of engineers led by Prof. Sandy Stevens Tickodri -Togboa at Makerere University. The first green Pettit car was originally named the Makerere Electronic Vehicle and later baptized Kiira EV at the time of Launch on the 24th of November 2011.
According to records, in 2008, before he submitted his final year project report, Prof. Tickodri- Togboa had as part of an extra -curriculum activity participated in the Torino Vision 200 Summit of which Mr. Ntambi was part. At the Italy summit, there were over 31 universities from all over the world under an association birthed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology popularly known as (MIT) to build a plugin electric hybrid vehicle.
On the contrary, Mr. Ntambi has alleged that during the project, he had asked Prof. Tickodri to come visit so that he could show him an idea of the plant used to built FIAT in Italy so that when they return to Uganda he would champion this ambitious dream of setting up proper innovative manufacturing. He further accused KCM CEO, Paul Musaazi of just being a desk person who “normally scoffed at the project and normally stated we were trying to con people by our plans of setting up manufacturing and yet when this support came, they now both claims to have had this dream.”
