Auditor General reflects on 2022 report |14 December 2023
There has been a general improvement from ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) in terms of managing their budgets compared to the previous years, even if there were instances whereby accounting departments have not respected financial legislation and regulations in place.
These were the remarks made by the Auditor General, Gamini Herath, during an interview with Seychelles NATION yesterday afternoon. Mr Herath was speaking on the 2022 report of the Auditor General.
He said in general the budget was properly managed and through the audit done, no extravagance or cases of large sums of money loss have been noted.
He added there were cases whereby revenues were not collected properly. The Auditor General also noted that procurement system is a major concern as each year similar issues arise.
Several MDAs do not necessarily abide by rules such as not seeking for required quotations or going through the tender process when need be.
In terms of the prompt collection of revenues by accounting departments, the Auditor General said this has been addressed in several organisations but there are few still which need to work on this aspect but noted the sums are not large ones.
These findings on such shortcomings are outlined in the report presenting the results of the Auditor General’s audit of the Annual Financial Statements (AFS) of the government for year 2022, which was recently submitted to the Speaker of the National Assembly as required by the Constitution and the Auditor General Act.
The report of the Auditor General also presents results of various other audits undertaken within MDAs. It also includes a special audit review of the management of the Cleaners’ Co-operative for the period of 2020-2022, undertaken at the request of the finance ministry.
Drawing the attention of the National Assembly, government, accounting officers and other decision makers to matters arising from carrying out his oversight role as the Auditor General, and commenting and providing information on the various public finance management aspects and administrative issues are two of the objectives of the report.
It also highlights some recommendations for improvement in good governance, accountability and transparency in the public sector and provides an update on the status of remedial action taken by various MDAs based on previous audit reports.
In an overview of his reflections on the 2022 report, Mr Herath said these audits were completed during the audit cycle from September 2022 to August 2023.
“I am pleased to note that many matters raised in audit management letters issued to the accounting officers throughout the audit cycle have been dealt with satisfactorily, however some still remain to be addressed,” he stated.
“Generally, the results of financial and compliance audits of MDAs are more or less similar and recurring. These are mainly the issues of non-compliance with prescribed financial rules, procedures and instructions.”
“A lack of adherence to the prescribed regulations in the procurement of goods and services by MDAs and in some instances the essential accounting records and control documents were either not kept or not updated timely, particularly, in the areas of revenue, stores, transport and fixed assets,” he said.
This has impacted negatively on the effective management of day to day operations in many MDAs, he added.
“The MDAs are proactive in dealing with audit issues, however, there are still a few that still wait until the last minute to respond to audit queries or they do not respond at all. I would like to encourage all accounting officers to respond to audit queries in a timely and comprehensive manner.”
Mr Herath pointed out in his reflections that as for statutory bodies with legal requirement to produce annual financial statements and subject to his audit, more bodies are now up to date with their annual accounts which he noted as satisfactory.
