Examine the corporate governance practices in public enterprises in Uganda: A case study of National Water and Sewerage Corporation

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to examine the corporate governance practices at National Water and Sewerage Corporation. This was driven by the fact that corporate governance practices are the key determinant of Public entities performance and it is widely acceptable by scholars and policy makers. The study was guided by three specific research objectives which include:-to establish the nature of corporate governance practices at National Water Sewage Corporation, to assess the challenges of corporate governance practices at National Water and Sewerage Corporation, and to design appropriate strategies that will minimize the challenges of corporate governance practices at National Water and Sewerage Corporation. The research design used was a cross-sectional quantitative survey, non-experiment and unit of analysis was staff of the NWSC. Primary data was gathered from managers, supervisors and staff using self-administered questionnaire anchored on Likert scaled range and was analyzed using SPSS to generate descriptive statistics including frequency tables, mean and standard deviation. Findings from the study indicated that majority of the respondents agreed to availability of appropriate board, board provision of management information and insight, adoption of appropriate control mechanisms in place to guard against misuse and abuse of resources, conducive work environment for employees, offering of technical expertise to the respective committees, corporate social responsibility were the dominant practices implemented by NWSC with the average mean of 3.9. However, respondents were non-committal on the challenges which include greater influence over the board, the board makes decisions that do not favor stakeholders, conflict of interest by members of the board and or executive management in handling the affairs of the corporation, members of the board lack independence in decision making, members of the board serve beyond their statutory/mandated time, limited funding affects the implementation of Board recommendation and corruption. Dominant strategies were reducing costs on board members, board independence, full disclosure of company affairs and effective risk management systems, accountability, transparency and limiting political influence. The study recommends that government, non-government organization and other stakeholders should sensitize public civil servants on relevance and appropriate ways of implementing desirable corporate governance practices to enable them operate in the public interest in order to boost their performance.