Latest update April 24th, 2024 12:59 AM
Oct 24, 2014 News
By Kiana Wilburg
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) which is chaired by Carl Greenidge, A Partnership for National Unity (APNU)’s Shadow Finance Minister, is currently gearing to examine the Auditor General (AG)’s 2012 report. However, while some progress is being made, the committee’s Chairman has disclosed that a number of matters still remain hindrances to the committee, such as the poor quality of the AG’s report and its lack of strong recommendations to defaulting agencies.
While House Speaker Raphael Trotman is still undecided on reconvening the sitting of the National Assembly, several committees have commenced work. One of the most diligent, according to Trotman, is the PAC.
On Monday, the Committee met to reschedule dates for the examination of agencies in the report of the Auditor General on the public accounts of Guyana for 2012, and to consider outstanding matters to be addressed by the AG, the Finance Secretary and the Accountant General.
In an interview with this publication, Greenidge expressed that the committee has concluded its examination of the AG’s 2010 and 2011 reports, and its draft report, which will include a number of recommendations to be taken by various ministries and entities, is expected to be completed by next week and circulated to the various PAC members.
The PAC Chairman stated that the committee at its latest meeting also looked at a report on the Auditor General’s Office which was based on its internal workings. Greenidge pointed that questions arose about the lack of clarity in some parts of that report, the problem of getting the quality improved, and the poor explanations that would be provided in some cases when the AG is addressing a problem.
He said that these deficiencies, which are clear in the internal workings of the AG’s Status Report, are often very evident in the AG’s report on the accounts of the country.
Greenidge said that when the PAC is examining the reports, quite often, explanations are not clear enough, there are certain omissions on some matters, some infractions have too much detail while some are not thorough enough, and there are “certainly not enough strong recommendations”.
“Quite frankly, the quality of the writing continues to be poor,” the Chairman asserted.
Considering that the committee has now completed its examination of the AG’s 2010 and 2011 reports, Greenidge was asked if he found that one report represented a more effective audit than the other.
To this he responded, “I believe that it would be unfair for me to comment on such, as we have not put together our report as yet, and we are in the process of doing so. I will pronounce on this after we have completed our draft report on the two AG reports.”
While Greenidge holds this view, Chartered accountant, Chris Ram, believes that the two reports are almost identical and that neither represents a strong audit.
On his website, www.chrisram.com, the accountant in an analysis published in October 2012 opined that in a country with weak accounting and accountability, an Access to Freedom Act that has not been brought into force, an Integrity Commission without Commissioners, no Public Procurement Commission, no anti-corruption or whistleblower legislation, the report by the Auditor General – if its Executive Summary is an indication of its contents – is striking for its sterility.
Ram said that a comparison of the 2011 Executive Summary is an almost identical reproduction of the 2010 report. He noted that the AG’s 2011 report was a less effective audit than 2010 “which in any case was itself not a good audit.” The Chartered Accountant believes that it ignored “the armies of contract employees, the off-constitution spending by that abomination called NICIL, slush funds across ministries, the dormant accounts, the loan recovery unit, and the National Frequency Management Unit.”
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