AGF suspended, minister shunned, and N26 trillion financial statement signed – Report

According to an audit report, a former Accountant General of the Federation unilaterally signed the N26tn Federal Government’s 2019 financial statement.

The information was revealed while the Senate Public Accounts Committee—chaired by Senator Ahmed Wadada—was debating the audit report.

In a 2019 report provided to the National Assembly, the Auditor-General of the Federation claimed the document was signed solely by the then-Accountant General without the then-Minister of Finance countersigning, in violation of financial regulations.

To bolster its allegation, the Auditor General’s office cited clauses from the Financial Regulations.

The Financial Regulations state in paragraph 103 that: “The President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria assigned to the Minister of Finance responsibility for all financial business of the federation, while paragraph 105 of the FR empowers the Minister of Finance to issue, from time to time, financial regulations, which is of general applications to ministries, extra-ministerial offices, and other arms of government.

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By implication, Nigeria’s Honourable Minister of Finance is in charge of all financial concerns pertaining to the government.

At that time, Ahmed Idris served as the Federation’s Accountant-General. He was removed from his position because to allegations of financial misconduct totaling N109 billion.

The audit report stated that, “Contrary to the current regulation, the Accountant-General of the Federation was the only officer of the Federal Government of Nigeria to sign the consolidated statement of financial position without indicating his FRC of Nigeria registration number, a component that carries the approval of the CFS.

“The Honourable Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning did not sign the Consolidated Statement of Financial Position with his FRC of Nigeria registration number.

The internal control system during the consolidation process may have been poor, as indicated by the aforementioned abnormalities.

Toyin Madein, the Federation’s acting Accountant General, responded to the story by denying that she was in that position when the financial statement was signed.