Senate faults Auditor-General annual Reports on govt agencies

Senate on Thursday hit hard on the Auditor- General of the Federation, Samuel Ukura for gross negligence on audited annual reports of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the federal government from 2009 to 2014.

The Upper Chamber directed the Auditor- General to issue clearance certificates to government agencies whose annual audited reports have been cleared.

Ukura incurred the wrath of the Senate from  its committee on Public Accounts during a probe  session it had with Heads of MDAs on annual reports of their audited accounts from 2009 to 2014.

The Auditor- General’s reports on the MDAs forwarded to the senate , indicted many of the agencies of non-submission of their annual audited reports from 2009 to 2014.

However, the agencies countered by claiming submission of the reports with evidence .

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in particular debunked the claim made in the report of the Auditor- General that it didn’t make available its audited reports of 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013.

It declared that its audited reports for the years listed, have long been submitted to the office of the Auditor- General based on queries raised to that effect.

The CBN Deputy – Governor ( Operations) , Bayo Adelabu represented the Governor – Godwin Emefiele.

He told the committee that in line with section 65 (3d) of the 1999 constitution as amended and Act of parliament of 2007, the apex bank submits its annual reports of any previous year on February 28 of 

According to him, the claim made in the report of the Auditor- General as regards annual report of CBN from 2010 to 2014, is false as the apex bank had submitted all the reports 2014 based on queries issued by the Auditor- General’s office.

A submission representative of the Auditor- General of the federation couldn’t countered when asked by the committee to respond.

Aside CBN, other agencies of government like the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, Nigerian Port Authority, Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) etc, also debunked claims made by the Auditor- General against them on non-submission of annual reports between 2009 and 2014.

The Auditor- General was represented by a Director in his office, Isaac Olurotimi Dada.

When pressed for response by the committee to the submissions of the agencies, he said reports forwarded to the senate on annual reports of the various government agencies were based on available documents on findings made.

A response that infuriated the committee chairman, Senator Andy Uba ( PDP Anambra South) and members who accused him of giving them unsatisfactory explanation inspite of earlier claims to be competent to represent his boss.

“Your boss is fond of declaring on the Television or Radio that his office had completed audited work on annual reports of the MDAs and always alleging that it is the National Assembly that is not working on such reports.

“[He] is not here today for the needed harmonization of these conflicting reports and even you that is here, is not competent going by your responses so far”, said the committee chairman.

© Copyright 2015 www.elombah.com. Send eyewitness accounts/reports/articles to publisher@elombah.com; follow us on twitter handle @Elombah; like our Facebook page: “Elombah.com”

For Diaspora Digital Media Updates click on Whatsapp, or Telegram. For eyewitness accounts/ reports/ articles, write to: citizenreports@diasporadigitalmedia.com. Follow us on X (Fomerly Twitter) or Facebook