Information is Power

The world’s economic pain was on full display Thursday with new bleak evidence from Europe and the United States of the mounting devastation wrought on jobs and economies by coronavirus lockdown measures. The European economy shrank a record 3.8% in the first quarter as lockdowns turned cities into ghost towns and plunged nations into recession. The drop was the biggest since eurozone statistics began in 1995 and compares with a 4.8% contraction in the United States. WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY: — More than 3.8 million laid-off workers applied for unemployment benefits last week as the U.S. economy slid further into a crisis that is becoming the most devastating since the 1930s. — U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that the new coronavirus was “not manmade or genetically modified” but say they are still examining whether the origins of the pandemic trace to contact with infected animals or an accident at a Chinese lab. — Americans are grappling with an essential question as t...

A new type of mobile banking malware has been discovered abusing Android's accessibility features to exfiltrate sensitive data from financial applications, read user SMS messages, and hijack SMS-based two-factor authentication codes. Called "EventBot" by Cybereason researchers, the malware is capable of targeting over 200 different financial apps, including banking, money transfer services, and crypto-currency wallets such as Paypal Business, Revolut, Barclays, CapitalOne, HSBC, Santander, TransferWise, and Coinbase. "EventBot is particularly interesting because it is in such early stages," the researchers said. "This brand new malware has real potential to become the next big mobile malware, as it is under constant iterative improvements, abuses a critical operating system feature, and targets financial applications." The campaign, first identified in March 2020, masks its malicious intent by posing as legitimate applications (e.g., Adobe Flash, Micro...

A coalition of Nigerian legal practitioners has dragged the People’s Republic of China to court over the effects of the Coronavirus outbreak on the West African giant. The lawyers are demanding $200 billion as damages for the “loss of lives, economic strangulation, trauma, hardship, social disorientation, mental torture and disruption of the normal daily existence of people in Nigeria.” This was contained in a statement on Sunday by the lead prosecutor, Prof. Epiphany Azinge (SAN) Azinge’s law firm, Azinge, and Azinge, is championing the legal action, stressing that they had concluded pleadings for the class action against the Chinese government. The statement added, “The team of legal experts planned a two-phase line of action-: first is with the federal high court of Nigeria and secondly to persuade the government of Federal Republic of Nigeria to institute a state action against the People’s Republic of China at the International Court of Justice at the Hague “The legal expe...

General Idi Amin Dada (Former President of Uganda). President Museveni says he was assigned by the East African Community Summit to sensitise East Africans on the need for the federation. He apparently looked at the problems of rising levels of L. Victoria, desert locusts currently troubling all the East African countries as well as the coronavirus pandemic. Museveni says if the East African federation had succeeded, East Africa would be where India is today. God is the one who put East Africans together. What God has put together no man should put asunder, he said. “Uganda is the bedroom, Kenya is the sitting room, Tanzania is the other bedroom, DR Congo is another room,” Museveni explained. Museveni said Tuesday that if the federation had been formed then, Idi Amin would not have come to power, massacres of Burundi would not have happened, the problems of Congo  would not have happened, the issue  of South Sudan would have taken shorter time to solve, genocide in Rwa...

        NRM's Sembabule Woman MP Anifa Kawooya distributing relief to constituents. President Museveni on Tuesday gave a silent order for the arrest of ministers and the ruling party NRM MPs who are distributing food and other items. Museveni says MPs distributing items are interfering with the coronavirus fight. “How do you arrest MP Francis Zaake and leave these ones of NRM including ministers who are also distributing items?” “We’ll have to learn from these bad experiences. This will have to be looked into.” Museveni who also spoke on Shs20m money to MPs, said this was “bad planning”. “It is morally incomprehensible and unacceptable for MPs to give themselves money.” He said the other politicians who were “donating” should have been arrested too not just Mityana Municipality legislator Zaake. He asked about the guidelines under which they were distributing items instead of leading by example and not “mixing up the population”. Zaake remains in detention at...

             Lt. Col Edith Nakalema Since the creation of State House Anti-Corruption Unit (SHACU) in December 2018 by His Excellency, The President of Uganda, Gen. Yoweri Museveni acting under Article 99 (4) of the Constitution, the Unit has in liaison with the Criminal Investigations Department of Uganda Police acting under Article 120 (3) (a) and other constitutionally mandated agencies carried out several anti-corruption investigations and caused the charging of several persons before the Courts of Law. From inception to date, the Unit has so far conducted investigations on corruption related offences in the Central Government (Ministries, Departments and Agencies), Local Governments and the Private Sector. These investigations are so far worth 250Bn/=. 146 persons have been charged before Courts of Law out of whom 120 are public officers currently on interdiction and 26 are Private Companies/Individuals. Fourteen(14) of these persons have been con...

              Speaker Rebecca Kadaga. Parliament has decided to send the Shs20m COVDI-19 money returned by Members of Parliament (MP) to their respective District Task Forces to serve its intended purpose. While communicating to the house on Tuesday morning, the Speaker noted that the decision has been taken by the Parliamentary Commission not to return the money to the government coffers as it was imagined by a section of members of the Public and some MPs. Since last week, a number of legislators have returned the Shs20m that was disbursed to MPs’ accounts. Some of the Members of Parliament that have so far returned the money include; Masaka Municipality MP, Matias Mpuuga, Nyabuzo County MP, Col. Fred Mwesigye, Sheema District Woman MP, Jacklet Atuhairwe, Mityana Municipality MP, Francis Zaake and Kyadondo East MP, Robert Kyagulanyi Sentamu. These have cited several reasons as to why they have chosen to return the money instead of sharing it ...

                     The Parliament of Uganda.              Minister of State for Mineral Development, Sarah Opendi denying the Passing of the New Cities. Tororo District Woman MP who is also the Minister of State for Mineral Development, Sarah Opendi has stood out as the only legislator that has voted rejecting the passing of new cities in the country. Parliament has since Tuesday morning held plenary session which was dedicated to the passing of new cities after a motion for the alteration of boundaries was passed in December, 2019. Last year, Parliament would not cast a vote on the creation of the said cities since it fell short of the required number of legislators of over 223 members. However, on realising quorum, the Speaker today went ahead to administer the vote where members would openly stand and announce their vote. A total of 325 members participated in the exercise however only...

Researchers have uncovered a potential means to profile and track online users using a novel approach that combines device identifiers with their biometric information. The details come from a newly published research titled "Nowhere to Hide: Cross-modal Identity Leakage between Biometrics and Devices" by a group of academics from the University of Liverpool, New York University, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, and University at Buffalo SUNY. "Prior studies on identity theft only consider the attack goal for a single type of identity, either for device IDs or biometrics," Chris Xiaoxuan Lu, Assistant Professor at the University of Liverpool, told The Hacker News in an email interview. "The missing part, however, is to explore the feasibility of compromising the two types of identities simultaneously and deeply understand their correlation in multi-modal IoT environments." The researchers presented the findings at the Web Conference 2020 held in Taipei...

1.BARS AND NIGHT CLUBS TO REMAIN CLOSED. 2.BOARDING PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SCHOOLS TO OPEN(no external visitors allowed, day scholars to remain closed). 3.UNIVERSTIES TO REMAIN CLOSED. 4.LODGES TO STAY Closed. 5.TAXIS TO START OPERATING"(only 9 people allowed than the usual 14). 6.BUSSES TO START OPERATING (with half number of passengers than the usual one). 7.SHOPPING MALLS TO OPEN(with limited number of people allowed, saniters every where). 8.CURFEW EXTENDED TO 10PM-6PM. 9.ALL PEOPLE IN TOWNS AND CITIES TO WEAR MASKS ALL THE TIME. 10.BODA BODAS TO OPERATE NORMALLY (with only one passenger and both of them wearing masks). 11.restaurants to open (with a social distance of 1.5m). 12.SOCIAL DISTANCE TO BE ON 1.5M THAN THE USUAL 4M. 13.CHURCHES AND MOSQUES TO REMAIN CLOSED. 14.WEDDINGS AND FUNERALS TO REMAIN AT STATUS. 15.OFFICES TO OPEN(Only those with limited people) 16.GROCERIES TO OPERATE (maintaining the social distance).

The budget which saw an increment of over shs6 trillion from the 2019/2020 budget was passed Friday, 24 April 2020 at a sitting chaired by Speaker Rebecca Kadaga following debate on the budgetary allocations where MPs called for interventions in the health sector amid the current corona virus pandemic.  The debate following the adoption of the Budget Committee report which recommended that government revises and reviews the Budget after the full effect of Covid-19 on the economy is ascertained. According to the sector allocations, Works and Transport takes an allocation of shs5.84 trillion followed by Security with an allocation of shs4.504 trillion. Interest payments will take shs4 trillion, Education shs3.6 trillion, Health sector budget is shs2.7 trillion while the Agriculture sector gets shs1.324 trillion. The budget is expected to be funded by resources from domestic revenue amounting to shs21.7 trillion and domestic borrowing shs3.55 trillion. Energy and Mineral Devel...

Good morning my people of Yumbe, after wiring 20M Covid-19 supplementary budget to my account i decided to topple 10M to buy these relief items to serve my vulnerable starving constituents who are home in respect of government directives aimed at fighting the spread of coronavirus. I will soon be delivering these relief items to Yumbe District COVID19 task force. Thank you!!

                    Arua Regional Referral Hospital.                     At least three residents of Arua Municipality are at large after handling materials for treating the five coronavirus patients at Arua Regional Referral Hospital were disposed of at the incenator by medical staff without burning the overall and other materials at 10am on Sunday. As a result a lunatic residing near where tipper lorries are parked picked the overall suit,put on it and disappeared into Oblivion as two kids namely Shafiq and Junior who are residing with the secretary to the LC1 Chairperson of Muru cell,Pangisa Ward in Arua Municipality picked other Covid-19 infected materials to play with. The LC1 chairman of Upper Bibia cell Mr Ivan Sukur tried to follow the matter up with the Director of Arua Regional Referral Hospital Dr Nyeko Philbert but he couldn't get any help from the authorities. Su...

What to Know About it Before You or Your Organisation  Becomes Prey To Hackers. Cloud services have become increasingly important to many companies' daily operations, and the rapid adoption of web apps has allowed businesses to continue operating with limited productivity hiccups, even as global coronavirus restrictions have forced much of the world to work from home. But at the same time, even major corporations have fallen prey to hackers. How can you maintain the integrity of your IT resources and data while still taking advantage of the benefits of software as a service (SaaS)? While cybersecurity is a broad and complicated topic, let's consider a hypothetical SaaS scenario and examine some of the risks. Imagine that one of your employees is writing a sensitive report. It could have financial or medical data in it. It could have information on a revolutionary new design. Whatever it is, the report needs to be kept confidential. What would happen if your employee writes the...

Members of the South Sudanese Ministry of Health Rapid Response Team prepare to take a sample from a woman at her home. South Sudan confirmed its fifth Covid-19 case Thursday after testing travellers headed in and out of Juba. Dr Angok Gordon, Covid-19 incident manager at the National Ministry of Health, told The EastAfrican on Thursday evening that the case describing is a South Sudanese national. “The fifth case is confirmed as a local transmission. We today tested some people who wanted to travel out of the state and one tested positive of the pandemic” said Dr Angok The Ministry of Health, through an order from the High-Level Taskforce on Covid-19, introduced a policy of testing travellers from Juba to all States as a preventive measure to mitigating the spread of the virus to the grassroots. The policy permits an individual to travel to the state with clearance license. Thursday’s results according to Dr Angok came as a result of the policy. The case brings the number of t...

Mityana deputy CID officer, Eric John Wabwire, has been charged with theft of Shs3m from a dead man. Wabwire appeared before Mityana chief magistrate Elias Kakooza Friday and was remanded to Mityana prison. He allegedly stole the money from the body of one Yasin Mugisha. Wamala Regional Police Commander Mr Bob Kagalura, said that Wabwire who was in company of the Scene Of Crime Officers in August 2019 picked the money from the deceased at the scene of crime. He adamantly refused to count it in the view of the public and told the onlookers that the money was to be exhibited. Unfortunately the money was never exhibited, neither was the murder case properly investigated. The efforts by the widow to claim the money from the Police Station was futile until a formal complaint was brought to the attention of the newly deployed Regional CID officer Madam Tesiima. Monitor #osutayusuf

In a recent highly targeted BEC attack, hackers managed to trick three British private equity firms into wire-transferring a total of $1.3 million to the bank accounts fraudsters have access to — while the victimized executives thought they closed an investment deal with some startups. According to the cybersecurity firm Check Point, who shared its latest investigation, nearly $700,000 of the total wire transferred amount has permanently lost to the attackers, with the rest of the amount recovered after researchers alerted the targeted firms in time. Dubbed 'The Florentine Banker,' the sophisticated cybercrime gang behind this attack, "seems to have honed their techniques over multiple attacks, from at least several years of activity and has proven to be a resourceful adversary, quickly adapting new situations," the researchers said.   'The techniques they use, especially the lookalike domains technique, present a severe threat — not only to the or...

It seems Ministry Of Health is testing patience of Ugandans. You cannot lock in innocent 45m Ugandans and keep importing expensively Corona virus from neighbours simply because we are land locked. What motivation do they have to assume Ugandans will remain loyal even in the face of hunger and monetary poverty? It should be noted that loyalty and discipline has limits. An hungry man is angry. You cannot convince anyone anymore to stay indoors, closing down thousands of businesses, hiking unemployment, thwarting education, sabotaging many institutions, spending over $65,000 per day on testing non citizens and treating them using Ugandan resources without an exit plan yet assume citizens are that gullible to continue dancing to your neocolonial tunes.  Cushioning the well off at the expense of the already squeezed between rock and a hard surface doesn't make sense. Given Uganda's current very poor (near non existent) social safety nets, the people now think otherwise; MoH ...

Members of the Cabinet on Thursday joined Members of Parliament in disagreeing with the guidance of the Attorney General William Byaruhanga on the court over the 10bn intended to facilitate the House activities on COVID-19. ● Urban Development State Minister, Isaac Musumba and his Sports counterpart Denis Hamson Obua couldn’t hide their disagreement in principle with the Cabinet colleague (Byaruhnaga) but had to openly come out and strongly oppose the version that MPs should not use the money sent to them to nobly fight Coronavirus. ● Obua noted that MPs are not party to the Tuesday High Court ruling and nobody served them the order. “We are not aware that the petitioners took Members of Parliament to court but the Parliamentary Commission and the Attorney General.” Musumba warned that a precarious precedence is being created for MPs defeated on the floor of Parliament to rush to court. He said the aspect has been ignored but has serious bearing on the future of the constitutio...

Four truck drivers heading to  DRC via Arua  have been confirmed to be positive with COVID_19.  Now Intercepted at Pakwach pending Medical team to handle them. Other 7 truck drivers in the same convoy may also be quarantined since they have been in contact with their fellow truck drivers. Medical experts to advise. All the trucks  Entered via Mutukula on 19th Apr 20.  1. Aman Ramathan papa, a Tanzanian, M/v number T210BYM, Going to arua.  2. Elia Simon Bukuku, a Tanzanian, M/v number T896DSD, heading to arua.  3. Hussein khalifan, a Tanzanian, M /v number T518CAK, heading to DRC via Vura.  4. Addul Kheri Makele a Tanzanian heading to arua, M/v number T911DSD. Security on alert to foil any riots against the decision to treat the patients in Arua.

Coronavirus dies in sunlight in just minutes, groundbreaking Homeland Security study reveals. SUNLIGHT could kill the coronavirus within minutes, the US Department of Homeland Security revealed Thursday. New research from the  DHS Science and Technology directorate found that high humidity, temperatures, and sunlight kills the virus in saliva droplets on non-porous surfaces and in the air. Sunlight could kill the coronavirus within minutes, a new DHS study revealed ThursdayCredit: Getty Images - Getty The virus can be killed by direct sunlight on non-porous surfaces, according to DHS Science Tech Advisor Bill BryanCredit: AP:Associated Press "Our most striking observation to date is the powerful effect that solar light appears to have in killing the virus on surfaces and in the air," said  DHS Science and Technology Advisor Bill Bryan. "We've seen a similar effect as well where increasing the temperature and humidity or both is generally less favorable to the...

After Meeting Museveni, Kadaga Orders MPs to Spend Shs 20M on National Response to Covid-19. Members of Parliament (MPs) have been directed to spend the sum of Shs20m advanced to them by the Parliament Commission to only interventions meant to support National Response to COVID-19 in their respective districts. The directive was issued by the Speaker of Parliament, Rebecca Kadaga while reading out new guidelines to legislators on how to spend the money that was advanced to them off the Shs10bn allocations to Parliament in the fight against COVID-19. Kadaga said that the new guidelines follow a meeting that was held yesterday, between the President, Speaker and the Prime Minister and it was agreed that MPs be incorporated in the activities implemented by the National structures. The Speaker said that hence forth, MPs have been incorporated within the respective District COVID-19 task forces as members though the structure and leadership of the district force shall remain as it i...

Mr Jacinto Obeti sympthazing with 106 year old woman who lost everything to fire. PHOTOS BY GEOFFREY ANGUPALE MARACHA . Over two hundred people in Rikabu village in Robu parish, Kijomoro sub-county, Maracha district are sleeping under trees after a mysterious fire burnt down their houses. This, despite the onset of rains that have escalated their conditions and left them at a risk of contracting diseases and dying of hunger. In the on-going disaster, 107 houses from 82 households reportedly started burning in December last year but to date the cause remains mysterious. Mr Joseph Lulua, whose four houses have also been burnt down narrated that the houses mostly burn between 3am and 4am. “Only one house remained in my home here in which my elderly mother was sleeping until it got burnt on Easter Monday, I failed to see how it caught fire although I pretended to be on guard under a tree behind it”, Lulua lamented. The residents are now struggling to erect semi-permanent structures with ir...

Museveni meets chairman and founder of Tullow Oil Aidan Heavey and then Tullow Uganda boss Mugerwa. Tullow and Total E&P Uganda B.V. (Total Uganda) have signed a Sale and Purchase Agreement (SPA), in which Tullow has agreed to transfer its entire interests in Blocks 1, 1A, 2 and 3A in Uganda and the proposed East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) System (the Uganda Interests) to Total Uganda for a cash consideration of US$575 million plus potential contingent payments after first oil (the Transaction). Tullow is currently the operator of Block 2. Total Uganda is currently operator of Block 1 and Block 1A and CNOOC Uganda Limited (CNOOC) is operator of Block 3A. The Cash Consideration consists of US$500 million payable at completion and US$75 million payable following Final Investment Decision of the Lake Albert Development Project.   Additional cash consideration may be received by Tullow in the form of contingent payments which will be payable on upstream...