Last month, Mr Andrew Onwudili assumed duty as the Director of Audit, Overseeing the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation (OAuGF). Onwudili’s appointment followed the retirement of the immediate past Auditor-General of the Federation (AuGF), Mr Adolphus Aghaghu, on September 7, 2022. Being the most senior director, Onwudili, is to oversee the OAuGF, pending the appointment of a substantive AuGF.
For close watchers of the Federal Government, the succession process at the OAuGF has generated little public attention. This is because the establishment is seen as one engrossed in the adroit generation of routine reports that have not brought any material change.
The OAuGF is a government institution whose role is to scrutinise the public sector in order to see to it that there has not been any wastage of taxpayers’ money and that the government delivers services in an equitable, efficient and effective manner for the benefit of all the citizenry. It reports to the National Assembly.
The OAuGF has “Enhance good governance and public accountability through the conduct of audits to ensure better financial management and optimum use of public resources to maintain sustainable development” as its mission.
In reality, the outcome of its activities has yielded nothing but the opposite, even under the Muhammadu Buhari Administration, which came into office on the mantra of change and eradication of corruption.
For instance, a report of the AuGF in July 2018 disclosed that more ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) violated the Audit Law under Buhari than previous governments.
“More ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) have refused to submit their accounts for review since President Muhammadu Buhari assumed office. The poor compliance of MDAs to Nigerian laws on submission of accounts is worse in each of Mr Buhari’s first two years in office than any previous year since Nigeria returned to democracy from military dictatorship in 1999,” the report stated.
In recent times, the AuGF’s report has unmasked monumental corruption in MDAs of the Federal Government.
Without relenting, the report has indicted all the arms of government. It is a tale of unretired advances, irregular award of contracts, dubious spending, unapproved allowances, payment for services not executed and payment without voucher.
According to the 2019 AuGF’s report submitted to the National Assembly in November 2021, 27 MDAs failed to account for N323.5 billion in 2019. By this, they are deliberately violating rules on payments, remittances and tax, and dispensing with the government’s Financial Regulations requiring all officers responsible for expenditure to exercise due economy, as money must not be spent merely because it has been voted.
The same report further revealed that internally-generated revenues and other funds not remitted to the government by 15 MDAs amounted to N127.1 billion. Federal agencies fully funded from the treasury are mandated by law to remit all of their internally generated revenue to the government’s central account.
This is actually a regular pattern.
Of the N127.1 billion unremitted funds, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) recorded the highest figure, namely N125 billion. Nine MDAs spent N49.5 billion on items not budgeted for. Out of this sum, the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development alone spent N48 billion. This is actually a regular pattern. The OAuGF queries have become routine in recent years when the MDAs basked in mind-boggling corruption while the Muhammadu Buhari administration talked tough about cleaning up the system with no proof of concrete action to eradicate the burgeoning rot.
For instance, in a report considered by the Senate Committee on Public Accounts, the Auditor General had queried the Ministry of Petroleum Resources for printing awareness leaflets on the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) for the sum of N98.4 million without due process. The committee also found that N39 million was paid into the accounts of two members of staff in the ministry for “project monitoring” within the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. The AuGF’s query yielded no concrete action in these matters.
The audit reports have exposed many leakages that threaten the country’s finances and most of these leakages are man-made holes. These holes are dug by MDAs with either outright disregard for transparency and accountability or an inability to grasp the impact of their carelessness on the citizens they have been appointed to serve.
For a cash-strapped country, the AuGF’s report should be a critical tool for salvaging the nation and averting impending fiscal implosion. The National Assembly which is culpable in the humongous leakages of public funds should wear a garment of new heart for the survival of the country. With a total public debt profit of N42.84 trillion and over 90 percent of its revenue spent on debt servicing, mere brandishing of audit reports that would not lead to tackling the identified problems or bringing errant public servants to book is nothing but a ceremonial display of routing act.
This newspaper calls for a change in the use of the AuGF’s reports as a tool to reform the nation’s public accounts administration and salvaging a nation neck-deep in corruption which seems to have been unintentionally elevated to a competing priority among unscripted government workers.
The next substantive AuGF should deploy ways of reaching out to members of the National Assembly to see to it that the reports of the OAuGF are used to achieve the mission of the institution, namely “Enhance good governance and public accountability through the conduct of audits to ensure better financial management and optimum use of public resources to maintain sustainable development.”
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