By Mabinty M. Kamara
December in and out, the public has been presented with the Auditor General’s report, which gives us an insight into the government and other public sector institution’s public financial management performance. Such reports have always sparked public debates and outbursts that sometimes last only a month or so and the rest remains history as the report is left on the shelves and digital archives of the institutions concerned without due diligence in ensuring that the audit and accountability issues flagged in the report are treated with the importance that it deserved. Worthy to note is the fact that as time progresses, the issues in the report are swept under the carpet ensuring the debate dies naturally.
What does the report mean to Sierra Leoneans?
The Auditor General’s report is very crucial to the growth and development of every nation as it not only gives an insight into public financial management performance, especially in regards strict compliance with laid down processes and procedures, but it creates that kind of assurance and reminder between the people and the governors or other institutions that collect money for and on behalf of the people of Sierra Leone that public officials are held to account to the people for those monies received and how they were expended to ensure it serves the purpose for which it was provided.
Now, little did you wonder why such reports are published every year and with reoccurring issues that have been raised in previous years of audits without due consideration for appropriate actions that ensure that people are held accountable.
These reports raise several accountability issues about state resources not properly accounted for during the audit process with hopes that state institutions such as the Anti-graft agency, parliament among others, and civil society actors and the media act upon the reports. This is hardly the case in most instances, which is why we mostly see a repetition or carryover of issues in the current report from two or even three years back.
The abandoned necessity
The Government of Sierra Leone has over the years lost huge sums of resources as identified by the Audit Reports. For example, in 2021 the Audit Report indicated that the Government of Sierra Leone experienced cash losses to the public purse amounting to Le187.3 billion (old Leones) -an incremental cash loss of 33.4 billion (old Leones) from the previous year (2020). Every year, the Auditor General’s report will come up with similar findings and recommendations for which little improvement on MDAs in terms of public financial management has been realized. For example, between 2011-2015, there were 959 recommendations for 8 entities, of which 276 were implemented, 618 were not implemented and 65 were in progress.
Most of the public entities and public officials responsible for this huge loss of the people’s resources are not held accountable or asked to refund, or face consequences for their actions. The media and Civil Society Organizations have been taking active positions in calling for those culpable to pay back these cash losses to the consolidated revenue fund.
As I write, the Ministry of Health alone is yet to account for the sum of Four hundred and ninety-two million, six hundred and sixty thousand old Leone (492,660,000) for a contract awarded for accommodation to leisure Lodge Hotel Garden Bar and restaurant for accommodation services to some Cuban personnel who were logged in the hotel for 30 days “the hotel in its invoice, included Le 64, 260,000 in respect of goods and services tax (GST). “A GST invoice was not issued and the receipt was also not a GST receipt indicating the possibility of nonpayment of this amount to the NRA,” chapter three-page 282 No. 3.5.4 of the report reads. All efforts to get a response from the ministry through its Public Relations Unit were aborted. This was initially highlighted in the 2020 audit report. Another state-owned enterprise, Sierra Blocks and Concrete Product Limited is yet to account for eleven million seven hundred and four thousand, two hundred and eight Leones (Le 11,704,280.50) from the 2017-2020 reports for withholding tax not paid to the National Revenue Authority (NRA).
We keep mourning economic hardship in the country when we have huge sums lying in God knows where without it being properly accounted for. The state needs those resources to address basic social amenities. Especially when it comes to tax compliance issues. Imagine, an institution reneging to pay due taxes to the national revenue authority which happens to be one of the key revenue streams for the government.
However, when the audit reports are published, the Public Account Committee looks into the audit recommendations. The committee’s report as in any other case has hardly been made public for the good of us all.
The media’s role
On the part of the media, like always, we rushed at the report, highlighting the accountability issues and the defaulting institutions for public attention but mostly to feed the news beats which is to fill up our newspaper pages and airtime by reporting those issues. Once most of what we consider newsworthy in the report is reported, that reporting chapter of the report is closed until another year when such a report is published. With constant follow-up on the reports for the defaulting institutions to act on the issues raised against them, it will also put the ACC on its toes to hold such people accountable for their actions. But I must confess that the media have failed in that regard due to several reasons largely due to either the lack of willingness of sources to speak to journalists when needed. To many, a piece of news is worthy when it breaks or due to the seeming lack of interest in public financial management issues. Thanks to constant follow-up by Budget Advocacy Network, the coalition of civil society organizations working in the Public Financial Management drive and its partner Christian Aid Sierra Leone that constantly keeps engaging the media in that regard, sometimes even reminding us of our watch and attack dog role as media practitioners which gives us the responsibility to hold public officials to account for their actions and inactions. On the part of the ACC, we often see press releases indicating proceeds collected from the issues raised in the auditor general’s report and the accounting institutions. However, with all the powers vested in the ACC, and the efforts they make in ensuring that the issues in the auditor general’s reports are properly accounted for, we often see a good number of recurring issues from the previous audits, sometimes a year or two aback.
Another issue worth noting about the report is that the recommendations are not followed to the core which according to a fiscal analyst Abu Bakarr Tarawally is responsible for the repetition of cases year in and out because people stick to their old ways of responding to the audit process. “At the moment you can't say for sure the reasons because it is not coming from the public officials who are supposed to come up with such. The Government has taken a step further by developing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), primarily to ensure compliance with the audit recommendations,” he said.
He added that non-state actors and civil society organizations have tried to popularize the SOPs and follow up on the implementation. “It is a gradual process until the improvement is realized. The queries often come from how public officials follow laid down procedures and processes in spending public money. If the audit report contains reoccurring issues of non-compliance, it either means, the public officials are blatantly disavowing the laid down procedures, which is an offense, or they do not understand something and are bound to repeat the same mistakes year in and year out,” he said.
The way forward: As we prepare to receive another Audit report this December, we urge the ACC to ensure that in the 2023 report to be published by next December comes a fresh one with little or no recurrent cases. That is possible anyway.
Those monies can go a long way in increasing our GDP and by extension serve as a boost to our records for accountability and transparency indices. Both locally and internationally to prevent climbing down the corruption index ladder on the next Millennium Challenge Corporation Scorecard if we must maintain the gains made so far in the fight against corruption generally. When the Minister of Finance was reading the Supplementary Budget in Parliament for the Fiscal Year 2023, he reiterated the fact that “Sierra Leone’s economy continues to grapple with the spillovers of the Ukraine crisis and associated global economic uncertainty culminating in weak domestic economic activity, rising inflation, exchange rate depreciation, and higher debt levels…”, he said adding that the implication on domestic revenue collection and expenditure management, cannot be underestimated. “The current trend in revenue in domestic revenue collection, though improving is insufficient to fully finance the ongoing and emerging expenditure pressure,” he said.
This highlights the significance of going under special pressure to recover the various cash losses from culpable individuals so that such revenue could be utilised to serve the interest of the state rather than individuals. Follow-up reporting is always of essence to the everyday work of a journalist because that is what mostly addresses or brings solutions to societal issues. The House of Parliament should give the audit report the desired attention and relevance by critically examining the issues raised therein and publishing the report of the committee. This is crucial because it is the House of Parliament that approves the budgets allocated to most of those institutions. Therefore, if one cannot properly account for that which was received, then a rethink is needed by the next budget allocation period.
Until people are held to account for their actions, we will keep having recurring issues in the Audit report.
Copyright © 2023 Politico (08/12/23)
