Shs 22,000 'transport fee' for a doctor already on duty, Shs 10,000 recovered in the dental unit: the impostors arrested in Mulago National Referral Hospital's wards

Mulago National Referral Hospital in Kampala is Uganda's largest public hospital, and many of its services are supposed to be free. That is what makes it a target for a different kind of fraud: not forged degrees, but people in white coats charging frightened families for care that costs nothing. In March 2026 two Ugandan outlets, The Observer and The Independent, both carrying Uganda Radio Network (URN) reporting, described how the hospital was trying to stop them.

According to The Observer (21 March 2026), a woman calling herself "Dr Atieno", identified as Penina Atieno, was arrested in the acute children's emergency ward after allegedly posing as a medic and soliciting bribes; The Independent (21 March 2026) said she was found sitting at a desk with a blood pressure cuff, and The Observer published a CCTV still of her posing as a medic. She had no medical training and was described as a former hawker. After reportedly threatening self-harm in custody she was moved to Wandegeya police station. In a separate incident, both outlets reported that Ivan Kamya was intercepted in the dental unit while allegedly running a "consultation fee" scheme for treatment and medicines that should be free; an attendant became suspicious and alerted security, and Shs 10,000 was recovered. Both suspects were expected in court the following week on extortion charges.

Both reports described the same method. Impostors pose as clinical staff at busy desks and in long queues, tell anxious relatives that a fee will skip the wait or reach a specialist, and vanish once paid. One woman who brought her injured father to the hospital told reporters she paid Shs 22,000 to a man in a clinical coat who said the doctor had left the unit and needed transport money to return, and gave him airtime to make the call; when she went looking, the real doctor was on duty and the "facilitator" had gone. An officer in the hospital's CCTV unit, speaking anonymously, alleged that guards took Shs 4,000 a day from each hawker entering the wards despite a management ban, and that middlemen had fought over territory in the casualty and assessment areas. Hospital spokesperson Gladys Baligonzaki Kajura said several impersonators had been arrested with the help of security and that a patient self-care desk had been set up to handle grievances and clarify which services are free.

The mechanism is identity by costume. Nobody checked a registration number because nobody expects to in an emergency ward; a coat, a confident manner and a plausible fee were enough. The hospital's countermeasures, security patrols, CCTV and a complaints desk that explains what is free, attack the information gap rather than the credential.

For students and families the lesson travels well beyond Kampala. In any public hospital, no genuine clinician collects cash in a corridor, and nobody needs a transport fee to find a doctor who is rostered on the ward. Ask for the staff member's name and hospital ID, pay only at an official cashier against a receipt, and report anyone demanding money to the hospital's complaints desk or the police before you hand it over.