The Senate Public Accounts Committee has urged the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation to beam its search lights on the spending of big revenue-generating agencies of government.
It specifically asked the acting Auditor-General of the Federation, Mr. Adolphus Aghughu, to focus more on auditing the accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), among others.
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The Chairman of the committee, Senator Mathew Urhoghide, stated this during the 2021 budget defence of the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation.
“You claim that you are auditing the account of the federation and you won’t touch the accounts of the NNPC, NPA, NIMASA among others.
“You will remove all the big spenders from your watch list but you will focus on smaller agencies. That is what has been happening from 2015 till date.
“We don’t want to be seeing these smaller agencies of government that you are focusing on because they can’t settle well. We are tired of seeing audit queries involving municipal councils leaving behind the big agencies,” Urhoghide told the acting Auditor-General.
He urged him to be proactive and stop corrupt activities before they occur.
He said, “Your negligence has led to the institution of corruption. Why should you wait for corruption to be consummated in Nigeria before you act?
“You should undertake performance audit at every stage of construction. You shouldn’t wait till the project is completed before raising the alarm and allow EFCC to step in and collect huge sums to fight corruption.
“It is because the auditors allows it. You are part of the cause of corruption in Nigeria.”
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