The Senate will publish the names of government agencies that have refused to appear before the Public Accounts Committee to defend the issues raised by the Federation’s Auditor General in the 2015 report.
Senate President Ahmad Lawan made it known after the Senate considered the report of the Public Accounts Committee on the annual report of the Auditor General of the Federation on the accounts of the Federation for the fiscal year ended. on December 31, 2015.
According to Lawan, any public official who refuses to account for the public funds at his disposal must be shown the path of resignation.
“It is one of our main responsibilities as a parliament to hold the executive to account.
“Anyone who is given the responsibility and confidence of running an agency with public funds must be accountable to parliament on behalf of the people.
“You have indicated a number of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs ) that did not show up to the committee after invitation, I want you to go through your documents, the invitation letters with reminders.
“This Senate will publish the names of these agencies for the public to know.
“This Senate will insist that any public servant or official who receives public funds for the public good and has questions to answer and refuses to appear to answer, should not have to be part of the government.”
“Because we are all supposed to be accountable to the people and therefore if someone thinks that they will not be responsible, then that person has nothing more to do in office.
“But I also want to say that those who came to defend or explain the interrogations of the Auditor General did the right thing and we must congratulate them for coming, that they succeeded in convincing the committee that the Auditor General was not well or not. They seemed responsible and accountable.
“For those who were able to convince the committee of the correctness of what they did, we congratulate them because they followed the proper accounting mechanisms established, probably by the Office of the Accountant General. “
He denounced the fact that most government agencies refused to comply with the accounting systems put in place by the office of the accountant general.
This, he noted, was responsible for fraudulent transactions by some MDAs.
He, however, urged the Public Accounts Committee to ensure that government agencies comply with the accounting systems and procedures specified by the office of the accountant general.
“In my experience as chairman of the Public Accounts Committee of this Senate, most government agencies do not adhere to established accounting mechanisms that will ensure accountability and transparency sent to them by the Office of the Accountant General. .
“We should go ahead and check the accounting systems established in most of these agencies.
“In my experience, there was a government agency in 2005 or 2006 that spent 1 billion naira on what they called social assistance.
“And this is to tell you that there is no system to stop this kind of thing. So we need to move forward, especially the big agencies, and look at the systems they follow to prevent people from doing the wrong things before we start looking for remedies. “
Lawan also revealed that the Senate will consider the committee’s possible recommendations after presenting a document for consideration.
“The report needs our study, just like most of our colleagues have said, let’s read it and then come back to the recommendations.
“But I will also suggest that you have all the recommendations in one place, because those are the recommendations that we will be looking at, rather than going through all the documents before adopting the recommendations. We should have the recommendations summarized.
Previously, the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, Senator Matthew Urhoghide (PDP Edo), said the findings showed that there was a constant violation of relevant constitutional provisions and other existing laws by the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation.
He declared that the late submission of annual financial statements was a violation of Article 49 (1) and (2) of the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) 2007 and Article 85 (5) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
He stated that there had been withdrawals of funds by the executive from the accounts of the special funds for purposes other than the purposes for which the funds had been created, and without recourse to the National Assembly for authorization, contrary to Article 80 (4) of the 1999 Constitution as amended.
Urhoghide noted that there was no collaboration between the two key agencies involved in the management and oversight of public funds – the Office of the Auditor General and the Office of the Accountant General.
He explained that the lack of cooperation between the two offices is an obstacle to an efficient, effective and transparent verification process of the nation’s Federation account.
He stressed the need to enact the Audit Service Bill, strengthen and streamline the audit process in order to ensure prudence in public finances and transactions.
The Senate, after examining the report of the Auditor General of the Federation on the accounts of the Federation for the financial year ended December 31, 2015, reserved it while waiting for the committee to summarize its recommendations to the Senate. (NAN)
