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Cameroon: Former GBHS Bamenda PTA Exco in FCFA 14m Scam
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The Post (Buea)
21 April 2008
Posted to the web 21 April 2008
Chris Mbunwe
An audit team of the Parents Teachers Association, PTA, of GBHS Bamenda, has tabled a report showing a deficit of FCFA 14,557,712, which former PTA President, Bernard Fru Tuka, is contesting.
Chief Auditor, Rex Kodang and two other co-auditors presented the budget on Saturday, April 18, at a meeting held at the GBHS Bamenda Conference Hall. They revealed that the budget as per 2006/2007 financial report stood at FCFA 33,627,237 and actual expenditure after the audit showed FCFA 19,069,525, and a deficit of FCFA 14,557,712.
This amount, they said, Tuka and his team are yet to explain. The report observed that after five months of thorough auditing, it was noticed that some expenditures had been included to inflate the budget.
The auditors said from bank records, the PTA President operated singled-handedly the accounts. This is buttressed by letters from the former Financial Secretary, Christopher Chunga, former Treasurer, Thomas Abanda Ngu and that of Tamanjo, the then Vice President.
The report further states that no contract was found between the PTA and any contractor for work or repairs during the year, even though the financial statement of May 19, 2007 mentioned claims to such payments.
"Looking through the credit union account, there was no proof that a contractor ever received money for services rendered, hence, we guess that most of the purchases and services rendered were fictitious," the auditors said.
They equally observed that there was no feasibility study made for the GBHS sports complex for which FCFA 150,000 was said to have been paid to ORICCA.
Recommendations
The auditors recommended that the PTA should, henceforth, stop executing projects in place of contractors, and that it should include in its executive the post of project officer who shall, in collaboration with the principal, conceive and follow up all projects.
The auditors also suggested that all PTA projects be put on tender for competition to certified contractors. Moreover, a corresponding debit or credit voucher should back all financial transactions.
To avoid embezzlement of PTA funds, the team recommended that all payments for jobs executed by contractors above FCFA 500,000 should be paid by cheque or payment voucher where the contractor must be identified.
The auditors further recommended that the contractor who is said to have done the work on the GBHS sports complex for FCFA 6 million, Mathias Asongwe Fon, be invited to complete the work or be prosecuted for embezzlement of PTA funds.
The auditors, however, expressed fears saying: "We have worked with all fairness and transparency, but our lives are being threatened"
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Accused Reacts
Fru Tuka and former Vice President, Paul Tamanjo, said Kodang was using the report to personally settle scores with them."An audit report is not a court judgment; it is an instrument of correction not of condemnation. Rex does not know what is happening in GBHS nor how the PTA functions.
That is why he has turned the whole thing into a personal affair," they contested. They claimed Kodang's audit report was biased.
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