By Crispina Cummings
The Public Accounts Committee in parliament has called on the immigration department to account fora shortfall of over Le115 million in the total of revenue generated and deposited with the National Revenue Authority. The 2010 auditor general’s report found huge discrepancies in the amount collected by the government department to that which it paid into the consolidated revenue fund at NRA. Acting deputy chief immigration officer, Alhaji Ansumana Marrah, said some of the areas of concern were that at the time of the audit there were no assessment ledgers for landing visa applications which was between May and June 2010. “There were no documents produced for emergency travelling certificates, no fuel chits for 2010, no logbook for 2010 and no life cards for vehicles”, he said, adding that revenue from the sale of passports for 2010 was estimated at Le3,515,150,000. When this was balanced against the amount received by the revenue authority (which was Le3,399,360,000)there was a difference of Le115,790,000that was not paid into the bank account. Deputy Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, Eric Koedoyoma, MP,insisted that there ought to be a convincing answer as to where the money had gone. He told the inquiry that they wanted to make sure that monies generated by or allocated to ministries, departments and agencies were used judiciously. The finance officer at immigration, Umaru Kakay challenged claims of shortfall and discrepancies, insisting that they had paid all monies into the designated bank account. “So the NRA collector at the department should be asked to give account of it”, he argued. To that end the committee chairman observed that there was a huge problem with revenue collecting institutions, especially given that there was a common complaint between NRA and institutions where they had their cashiers to collect money for them. He said institutions had always argued that as far as they were concerned, they had paid all monies to the NRA but most times without any proof of either bank statements to the effect, or such funds were not found to be in the accounts. He asked that NRA be summoned before the committee to clear the issue. © Politico 23/05/13
