The government has, over the years, conducted refresher training courses for civil servants to equip them with skills required to deliver on their responsibilities more efficiently.

It is, however, surprising that some government agencies are still failing in their duties, resulting into losses of taxpayers’ money through mismanagement, incompetence or corruption. One of them is Rwanda Education Board (Reb) whose books of accounts and operations were found wanting or suspect by the Auditor General’s office.

According to the Auditor General’s report for 2012/13, Reb lacks requisite accounting and database practices, which has resulted into gross misposting in their books of accounts. The agency failed to justify some of the recoverable loans when put to task by the AG’s office. This is a worrying situation that needs urgent remedies.

One wonders how the board tracks students’ loans and other activities if its records are suspect. With such irregularities, it was always going to be almost impossible for Reb to recover this money.

Reb or any other public institution for that matter should not be losing millions of francs on account of improper tendering procedures and other avoidable inefficiencies.

Such irresponsible behavior should not be tolerated. That’s what the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee, which started hearings yesterday, should thoroughly examine the loopholes that lead to such malpractices and devise appropriate remedies.

Most importantly, those responsible for such anomalies should not walk scot-free; they should be held accountable because impunity is not an option.