The NEWS (Monrovia)
4 December 2008
Monrovia — The collection of revenues for the Government of Liberia at the various outstations in the country has unveiled poor record system that it is difficult to substantiate the actual amounts collected during the years under review.
Audit report conducted by the General Auditing Commission (GAC) said there were no revenue records made available for the period under review (2005/06/2006/07) from Marshall, Zorzor, Ganta, Gbarnga, Salala/B-Mines and Buchanan collectorates.
According to the audit report, the reason given was that there were transfers of Senior Collectors from the collectorates in August 2007 before all the documents were moved.
However, the report added that there was an internal audit conducted and that the documents were at the archive at Internal Revenue Accounts Section at the Ministry of Finance.
The audit report indicated that revenue collections for the period under review could not be accounted for by the Senior collectors and the auditors were unable to verify the revenue collection for Marshall collectorate amounting to US$34,873.24 and US$68,420.58 in 2005/2006 and 2006/2007 respectively.
However, the GAC recommended that former senior collectors should produce the documents for the revenue collection amounting to US$98,515.07 and US$214,291.42 for 2005/2006 and 2006/2007 respectively:
The Commission urged the Ministry of Finance to ensure a proper handing and taking over procedure whenever one officer is transferred.
Interestingly, the report observed that receipt books collected from the Revenue Supply Office were torn by the Senior Collectors at the time of distributing them to the various collectors.
The Commission further urged the Ministry of Finance to take stock and issue enough revenue flag receipt books to the collectorates in order for the collectorates to issue a book to each collector.
The audit report cited that there were no safes or cash boxes maintained in Marshall, Zorzor, Ganta, Buchanan,
Gbarnga, Salala/B-Mines and Bo Waterside collectorates to keep the revenue collections.
It was also observed that money was kept in drawers, private business safes and at homes of these senior collectors.
The GAC warned that keeping government revenue in drawers, private business safes and at homes may render the revenue vulnerable to abuse and theft.
Therefore, the Commission added that the Finance Ministry should provide safes and cash boxes for keeping government revenue and all daily cash/cheque collections must be deposited into the safes and Cash boxes.
It added that the field collectors should hand over the daily collections to the Senior Collector at the end of the day.
"The Ministry of Finance may consider opening of transit accounts in the outside stations where banks exist for depositing of Government revenues for onward transfer to the Government account at the Central Bank of Liberia," the GAC mandated.
Continuing, the report pointed out that there was no register maintained to record receipts issued and balance of the stock of receipt books and other accountable documents at Marshall, Zorzor, Ganta, Gbarnga, Salala/B-Mines and Buchanana collectorates.
The Commission indicated that the lack of control over accountable documents may lead to losses of government revenue through fraudulent use of flag receipt books and that collectors of revenue could print fake receipt books and uses them to collect money outside the government system.
"According to the system of acquiring receipts by collectors from the Senior Collector, a formal request is made. However, out of 350 receipts received in May for two months, 54 were used, 200 were unused while 96 were unaccounted for although the agent indicated that the receipts were with the field collectors.
However, there were no documents to prove that the books were with the field collectors the unaccounted for receipt books could be used to collect Government revenues that may not be accounted for," GAC warned.
The GAC further recommended that the Commissioner for Internal Revenue should ensure that all the monies are recovered from the respective officers and that the Commissioner should send inspectors to the collectorates monthly to ensure that a system of internal control is in place to safeguard the revenue and receipt books.
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"The collection of revenues for the Government of Liberia at the various outstations in the country has unveiled poor record system that it is difficult to substantiate the actual amounts collected during the years under review"
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