Government Has Revoked Operating License of Bryan White Foundation and Deregistered Its Certificate Over Sexual Harassment Against Girls.

Officials from the National Bureau for NGOs Friday addressed the press on issues concerning the revocation of some NGO’s permits and certificates.

The National Bureau for Non-Government Organizations is a semi-autonomous Government entity under Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Patrick Onen Ezaga, Senior Communications Officer, Ministry of Internal Affairs, said since the validation exercise undertaken in August/September 2019, there have been a number of reports about NGOs & their activities in the media.

He said it is in the course of the routine performance of its mandate that the NGO comes across cases and issues relating to the activities of the NGOs across the country.

The NGO Bureau is currently following up on a number of case relating to NGO Operations and the country is informed accordingly.

He said the NGO Bureau has been actively monitoring the Bryan White Foundation and also received a letter dated 26th May, 2020 from the VC, Parliament etc raising concerns about the founder Bryan White (Mr. Kirumira Brain) and the purpose for his NGO’s registration.

Whereas the Bryan White Foundation has a valid Permit of operation, it did not validate and it has neither updated its status nor notified the NGO Bureau on anything regarding its operations.

Bryan White had been accused by several girls of sexual harassment after he promised to help them. Some of the girls said they had spent months at Bryan White’s home being used as sex slaves.

The investigations found that whereas Bryan White Foundation was supposed to be a company limited by guarantee with a board of directors and other members who would meet annually for a general meeting, Bryan White was solely running the organization.

Even the functions that it was licensed to perform like looking after orphans, widows and supporting youths to be self-reliant were never undertaken.

The organization also has no known physical address as the address it had indicated in its registration documents was only found to have a banner hanging in front of an unfinished building.

The Foundation also didn’t have any significant transaction in the bank account save for a one-off case where Bryan White deposited and later withdrew Shs10m.

It was after the discovery that the NGO Bureau tasked Kirumira to file an explanation about the operations of his organization.

However, the July 22 letter went unanswered hence prompting them to revoke the permit of Bryan White Foundation and also cancel its certificate of registration.

Another organization the National Bureau is investigating is GiveDirectly (GD).

The districts where GD is currently operating according to the NGO Bureau records are; Kampala, Kiryandogo and Bukedea.