Sufuyan Ojeifo
7 January 2009
interview
Lagos — Chairman, Senate Committee on Public Accounts, Senator Ahmad Lawan (ANPP, Yobe North), in this interview with Sufuyan Ojeifo, speaks on the directive given to the Auditor General of the Federation to audit the accounts of ten federal agencies, including the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and other related issues.
Could you let us into the state of the accounts of the nation because we expect that by now, the Auditor General of the Federation should have submitted the Audit Report up till 2007? How far has the office of the Auditor General gone and how far has your committee gone to leverage on the work of that office?
There is no doubt that the Auditor General of the Federation of Nigeria is working under the most difficult, the most hostile, the most unfriendly situation because here is an Auditor General of the Federation of Nigeria, a country with an annual budget of close to N3 trillion, who has no office, whose staff, the auditors that audit the accounts of the Federal Ministries have no offices but reside in the offices of those that that they are supposed to scrutinize. This working environment has made it very difficult for the Auditor General to actually compile the annual reports. I want to tell you authoritatively that the Auditor General is still in a three-bedroom bungalow in Wuse, using that place as his headquarters. 95 percent of his staff - the auditors-is spread across the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and before him, there was only one substantive Auditor General. The others people were acting. These two factors, in my view, have combined adversely to make the office of the Auditor General ineffective and inefficient.
Can you shed more light on these factors that have combined to render the Office of the Auditor General ineffective?
First of all, the last factor- the acting capacity in which the Auditors General operated in the past under the administration of Obasanjo- about three or four people acted. Of course, one person acted twice and that was to circumvent the constitutional requirement of the limitation of the acting capacity without Senate approval to six months. Most people in acting capacity tried to play the good boys. Therefore, when you have an Auditor General who is acting, he or she would necessarily be very careful with what he puts or she puts into the report as far as the executive is concerned, and this is to ensure that he or she is not going to do a bad thing. The purpose would be to secure the nomination into substantive appointment into the office. So, I think the Executive, maybe, cleverly used that process to make sure there was no good report or timely report from the office of the Auditor General in the past. We have a new Auditor General who is about a year or so (in office), who inherited enormous backlog. He had to battle with annual reports of almost three or four years - 2004, 2005, 2006 and still 2007. Therefore, he has to operate within the confines of these limitations and I can tell you that it has not been easy for him. However, he has so far tried to present the report up to 2006. I think the last part of the 2006 report arrived in this National Assembly about a week or so. But that is part one of the report. In the past, the other reports were presented without the part 2. The part 2 of those reports would also have to be worked out by the present Auditor General and the part 2 is also very important financial information. So, I think within this period, the Auditor General has tried to present the reports. But the fact that 95 percent of his staff are in various ministries and departments and agencies working as resident federal auditors is bad for the audit system in Nigeria.
How bad is this scenario and what should be done to reverse it?
It's so bad because these people are supposed to go in there, do their auditing job and get out of those areas. But what we have is a situation in which a resident auditor will go in and stay in there for three or four years. Therefore, he or she becomes invariably a part and parcel of that Ministry. With this kind of circumstance, you don't expect any serious or critical report from the Auditor because, to some extent, he or she could easily be compromised. In fact, he could even help in perfecting the documents and the figures would just reconcile and nothing bad would be obvious. So, I think the situation of the Auditor General and the circumstance of his staff is bad enough for the audit system in Nigeria. But let me tell you what we have tried to do to salvage the situation. In the 2008 budget, we insisted that the Auditor General for the Federation must have a befitting office where he and his staff or at least a majority of them would reside and have a secure, safe and conducive environment for them to operate.
A total of N1.5 billion was proposed at the time; and, of course, signed by the President in the budget. But I can tell you, nothing was released for that project and in the 2009 proposal, the Executive has cleverly removed anything like construction of office for the Auditor General. In fact, one can go to a very long extent to say that maybe the Executive doesn't want an effective and efficient Auditor General. Otherwise, why should the Executive on one hand be emphasizing on transparency, on due process, on probity and accountability and then also talk of anti-corruption, fighting the scourge of corruption, but on the other hand, not empowering the man who is supposed to ensure that financial transactions of the government of the federation of Nigeria are done according to the due process and the law. So, there is a contradiction here. If we really want to fight corruption, it is for us to make sure we fight it at the base where it will start from, not to wait until people do the wrong thing and then you ask EFCC or ICPC to go and catch them. I feel that the National Assembly today will see and always consider the Auditor General for the Federation as part and parcel of the legislature, rather than the executive because he is the one that when he works out his report, he reports to the National Assembly, rather than the Executive. So, we need good reports. We need timely reports. Most of the reports we have are now historical data, because of the backlog.
The ones we have are mostly old and, maybe, they don't even mean much. So, the National Assembly must take this challenge to rescue the office of the Auditor General for the Federation by appropriating reasonable funds to enable the Auditor General have an office that he would be able to work from. We are, as a Committee, proposing N2 billion for the construction of the office again, hoping that the Senate; and, indeed, the National Assembly will support our position. We visited Uganda about five months ago and as small as Uganda is, the Office of the Auditor General is a complex dedicated to Auditor General for the Federation of Uganda. There were suggestions by the Executive that the Federal Ministry of Finance will give some parts of their building to the Office of the Auditor General. But that is underestimating the sensitivity of the office or the work they do. The Auditor General needs an environment that is safe, that is secured, that is independent. He doesn't need anyone that he hasn't any responsibility to see and his staff should be rest assured that their documents are safe and that someone does not cross from one office and enter and pick things. When we heard that, we simply said no, that the office of the Auditor General goes beyond that. I think the Auditor General is about an arm of government, if I may go to that extent, because you have the legislature, you have the executive and the judiciary. These are separate arms of government. But the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria that establishes the office of the Auditor General says the Auditor General for the Federation of Nigeria does not take any orders or directive from anyone. That means he's independent. So, for such an office to be subsumed under Federal Ministry of Finance or, indeed, under any office, is a misnomer and, in fact, it's tantamount to compromising the office and making it perpetually ineffective and inefficient.
What Legislative measure does the National Assembly intend to take to retrieve that office from the stranglehold of the Executive?
We have already taken First Reading of the Bill that would establish the office of the Auditor General for the Federation. We want in the bill Auditor General to be independent, to have a Commission where they can employ their own staff, where they can discipline their staff. We want to also propose a first line charge of their budget so that they are independent of anyone. We want to ensure that the original idea of independence of that office is sustained and the Auditor General is not subjugated in anyway to any arm of government. But of course, Commonwealth countries wide where the Office of the Auditor General performs particular functions, you have an attachment and some working relationship between the Legislature and the Office of the Auditor General and nothing more. He doesn't work with the Executive. He doesn't report anything to them. All he does is if he notes any infringement on transactions, he writes to the Accounting Officers and say these are infringements, could you respond? If they respond and he's satisfied, then the matter is rested. If he's not satisfied or if there is no response at all, then he reports the case to the National Assembly that he has already written and there was no response or the response is not satisfactory.
Given the fact that you said they are bringing the reports in arrears, a number of audit queries must have been raised by the Office of the Auditor General. How is your Committee tackling this?
Initially, we started with 2002. But we discovered that most of these queries have been overtaken by events. We decided to take 2003 and 2004. What we did was to treat those that we felt are still relevant because some would appear to have simply been turned into historical information; Ministry has been changed, people are not there anymore or maybe some actions have been taken by the time we call someone to explain. But what we are trying to do for 2009, by the grace of God, is to jump to 2005 and 2006 before we get the 2007 report. We normally go through the process of selecting those that we think are relevant and current to some extent and we intend to work on 2005 and 2006 thoroughly. But because we also have reservations on the reports and contents some times, because of the factors I've given, on the streets, you would hear a lot of stories about so much financial problems happening in a ministry or department or whatever, but when we ask for the report, then you see nothing and you wonder where people are getting their information. Who is wrong? Is it that report that is wrong or the people? So, we also try to, on our own, request the Auditor General - we can't direct him - to audit some organizations, and by so doing, we have some work to do. We currently have about eight or ten of such reports and we intend to, after we come in the new year by the grace of God, intend to mix in our work between some elements of the reports that we think would be useful by the time we hold public hearing. It is not enough to ensure that the books reconcile. It is very important to ensure that after the reconciliation of the books, the numbers and the figures have tallied, that the work done has achieved the target that was set in the first place. That is to say that we go out to see the value that a project has added into our system.
You said you directed the Office of the Auditor General to audit some organisations. Would NNPC be one of the organisations?
Yes, NNPC is one.
There has been this impression that the NNPC run the public expenditure more in the realm of occultism. They don't render account. Have you gotten an insight into how to break this cult-like operation?
There are complaints about NNPC; every agency of government that wants information on the NNPC complains. About three days ago, I read in the papers where the Minister of State for Finance was complaining about NNPC. The NNPC could not come and present what they were going to contribute to the government treasury; even the Minister of Finance. But we have decided we will do our best to get to the bottom of this. In fact, we have asked even the Auditor General to go and have a holistic auditing of the Federation Account which was never done before. Audit the Federation Account and let's have or know all the inflows from whatever source and let's see how much went in from 1999 till this period; how much has gone in and how do they get out? We hope that he will succeed in this because I know that it's not easy, since the system is not used to this. But I think the man is also determined with his staff. They should be able to do that. When we get the report, I think that will constitute the rest of our work for maybe 2009 because that should be wide enough. It will give us all leads we need to how the monies have been spent. All these things we try to investigate. When you don't even know how much you actually have, it makes it difficult for you to understand and comprehend the extent of compliance or damage done to the system, until you know exactly what you have. But as it is, for a long time, I think National Assembly committees that have oversight over NNPC have always complained that it has not been easy and, in most cases, not even possible to get information. The little that comes out maybe would not be sufficient guide for committees to really make a head or tail out of the information.
How hopeful are you that the nut will be cracked this time around?
I'm hopeful and very optimistic because there is a change in personnel in the system. One, we have a President who keeps on emphasizing and who stands for transparency, probity and accountability and due process. So, I want to believe that Mr. President will always support any effort, any attempt, at getting to the roots of our expenditure, our earnings and expenditure. This is one way and it's for the benefit of all Nigerians. Two, there is also a change of baton in the leadership of the NNPC. I want to believe that the GMD will behave like the President would, that is also to yield to due process, transparency, probity and accountability. But let me tell you; if we fail to get the cooperation of those who should cooperate, we will seek every possible legislative support to get the information. Of course, in addition, the present Auditor General is a determined person, very hard working and I want to believe that he will, given the information, prepare the report in good time and submit to us. As soon as we get that, I want to assure you that we will make it as snappy as possible because we want to redefine the auditing process itself. We are thinking that we shouldn't be just looking for faults. We should be looking at the processes and procedures as well. Sometimes, the procedures themselves allow organizations to do things in bad ways. Maybe in some cases, there are no clearly defined rules or regulations to follow and clever organizations take advantage of such loopholes and maybe do things wrongly. So, we want to expand our horizon to looking also into deficiencies and defects in systems so that while concentrating and fixing your focus on what happened, you should also be looking at the system itself; has this regulation the capacity to block every possibility of doing things wrongly?
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