The details of the 2019 audit report cast a big doubt on the commitment of Africa’s most populous nation to fighting corruption and ensuring proper use of government funds.
A Dataphyte review of the 2019 audit report has shown that Nigerian Ministries, Departments and Agencies spent monies without regard for accountability nor respect for the well-publicised anti-corruption ‘stance’ of the current President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration.
Documents obtained by Dataphyte showed that a total of N132.5 billion were flagged as irregular and unapproved allowances. These amounts were not approved for payment nor captured in their budgets. Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc had the highest amount of irregular and unapproved payments to the tune of N97.9 billion.
Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority and its Can of Worms
Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority did not spend the sum of N2.5 billion meant for Capital projects and the authority failed to return the money to the federal treasury. According to the basin development authority, they were “ensuring” that the federal government did not carry many liabilities is why the monies were not returned
The Authority also approved the sum of 18 Million naira for foreign travels for the Managing Director and other directors also without proper approval. When asked by the Auditor General, they said it was approved by the Ministry of Water Resources but failed to prove the monies were spent as captured because they were unable to produce documents such as air tickets, reports from the conference/seminar they “attended”.
The same organisation paid the sum of N31.8 million to a security company without a letter of employment, a Memorandum of Understanding nor vouchers to back up the payment submitted to the Auditor-General. Efforts to review these documents were met with resistance as the management of the authority stated that the documents could only be gotten at their office for verification.
Again, the Anambra-Imo River Basin commission failed to audit their accounts for five(5) financial years from 2015 – 2019.
Despite the Treasury Account Policy of the Nigerian government, a sum of N2.6 million was reportedly diverted.
The Managing Director of Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority was stated to have opened two commercial Bank accounts named “Anambra Imo River Basin Rural Dev. Account UBA No. 1000270710” and “Diamond Bank (Access Bank) Account Number 00043314444”.
The Managing Director was also said to have transferred revenue generated as rent from Authority’s Staff Quarters in 2018 of N1.27 million and N1.15 million in 2019 totalling 2,421,050.00 and other funds of 272,000.00 that would have been in designated TSA account to these UBA and Access Banks accounts.
Against financial regulations, 38 staff members got unusual increments in their salary to the tune of N13 million, the auditor noted there is a need for the money to be refunded back to the federal treasury especially as the management failed to provide a convincing explanation for the unusual payments.
Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority Attitude to Audit, Indicative of MDAs Unwillingness to be Audited
A review of the responses to the queries of the auditor by the Anambra-Imo River Basin Development authority shows resistance to audit processes.
In some instances, the management failed to respond to the auditors’ queries while in other instances gave answers that are financially unsatisfactory.
In the document, it was noted that the auditor was denied access to records and documents of the authority, the management in other instances, said the documents were available in their office, implying the auditor or his representatives must physically be at their offices to access the records.
The resistance to responding to the auditor general’s queries appears to cut across most MDAs ranging from vague to outrageous to a complete lack of response. This reflects poorly on the Buhari-led administration much talked about commitment to fiscal transparency and anticorruption.