The house of representatives committee on public account says 65 agencies of government have never been audited since they were established.
Oluwole Oke, chairman of the committee, disclosed this on
Monday at an event in Lagos.
The standing orders of the lower chamber empower the
committee to examine the accounts of ministries, departments and agencies
(MDAs) to ascertain the utilisation of funds appropriated by the house.
Speaking at the event, Oke, who was represented by Abdullahi
Abdulkadir, deputy chairman of the committee, said 12 MDAs were not audited
from 1993 to 2010, while 65 agencies have never been audited.
“The 2016 report of the OAuGF threw up quite a number of
intractable issues which then required very careful scrutiny even with the
previous years’ reports,” Oke said.
“Prominent among these issues was the refusal by ministries,
departments and agencies of government to render accounts of stewardship, and
in many cases, these accounts were rendered very late.
“In addition to the above, 12 MDAs have never been audited
from 1993 to 2010, and 65 agencies have never been audited since they were
created. This situation gave rise to the well-publicised and just concluded
public hearing on this subject matter to which all of you were witnesses.
“A number of agencies were found wanting in terms of
rendition of audited accounts to the auditor general of the federation.
Constitutionally, for ministries, departments and agencies, the auditor general
of the federation work on their accounts”.
The committee chairman assured that the names of the
agencies will be made public after the green chamber conclude investigation on
it.
“Sixty-five agencies have never been audited before. This is
an issue that is still before the national assembly. The names of the agencies
will be made known to the public after or when the house starts to consider
it,” he said.
“The contemporary rules we have, especially concerning
financial regulations, specify certain penalties to these agencies.
The lawmaker said the country cannot make “meaningful
progress” if MDAs do not change their “mindset with respect to audit issues
raised by the OAuGF.”
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com