AG’s Report: Lawmakers want criminal liability apportioned

Members of Parliament want all civil servants suspected of misusing public funds brought to book . MPs raised this proposal yesterday after presentation of the Auditor General’s report for the fiscal year 2012-13 by the Auditor General Obadiah Biraro. The report showed that billions of taxpayers’ money had either been misappropriated, or spent without supporting documents. “The challenge we have is that institutions implementing programmes meant to impact on the community are misappropriating funds,” complained MP Marie Josée Kankera. Kankera was referring to some institutions like the Energy, Water and Sanitation Authority (EWSA), which according to the Auditor General, Obadiah Biraro, presented a disclaimer opinion, the worst qualification an audit report can get. The outstanding issues in EWSA include a “suspense account”, a situation where an institution grossly mismanages public funds while making a false impression that their financial operations are okay. Biraro stated that over Rwf28 billion was channelled through this account, and could not be accounted for by the auditors. MP Fortunee Nyiramadirida said: “I am not surprised by EWSA’s poor performance. They would not have performed better since they operate without a strategic plan as stated in the report.” Other issues that angered the legislators included the expiry of the drugs in King Faisal Hospital, a national referral which Biraro said “qualifies for insolvency.” The report says drugs worth over Rwf300m expired from stores. The Ministry of Education was also in the spotlight over failing to track the loss of laptops in the one laptop per child programme where over 500 laptops got lost. Jean Thierry Karemera, who is also a member Public Account Committee (PAC), said: “Some institutions have recurrent problems but whenever their heads are summoned, they always promise to change but do not. There should be individual culpability. Individuals should own up to their mistakes.” “We are lucky that the financial managers in audited institutions have signed the reports. The way forward is for them to be brought to book so they can explain these losses,” said Juvenal Nkusi, the PAC chairperson. Jean Damascène Ntawukuriryayo, the president of Senate told the MPs who were impressed by the improved accountability situation in the country according to the report. He reiterated the legislators’ constitutional obligations to look into the report and take appropriate measures within a period of six months. Points of comparisons with last year’s Auditor General’s report: Audit opinion more positive: There was notable improvement across the board as regards book keeping and public funds management in the financial year 2012/2013 because 32 per cent of all audit reports (45 reports) obtained unqualified (clean) audit opinion, compared to 28 per cent last year” (2011/2012). Wasteful expenditure goes up: Wasteful expenditure was higher this time around (2012/2013) at about Rwf1 billion in comparison to Rwf0.8 billion the previous year. Embezzlement level near parity: A total of Rwf1 billion in fraudulent activities had not been recovered by the time of audits this year. This unrecovered balance includes amounts for fraud cases identified during the audits, and outstanding recoveries from previously reported fraudulent cases. Fraud cases identified during the 2013/2014 audit cycle amounts to unrecovered Rwf532.6 million while fraud cases identified over two years ago and remain unrecovered amounts to Rwf537 million Unsupported expenditure goes down: Chief Budget Managers in assessed public entities did not provide the necessary documents to account for utilisation of Rwf2 billion received by these entities during the fiscal year 2012/2013, down from Rwf2.9 billion the previous year. The proportion of allocated budget covered by the audits increased: The proportion of expenditure covered by audits reported within this year’s report of 79 per cent is higher than that in the previous reports, and this has been increasing over the years. Additional reporting by Eugene Kwibuka

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AG’s Report: Lawmakers want criminal liability apportioned