Deputy Minister for Finance, Dr. John Ampontuah Kumah has urged the Internal Audit Agency (IAA) to develop cutting-edge tools and programs to strengthen the work of auditors to support the government in its fiscal consolidation efforts.

The Deputy Minister, and Member of Parliament for Ejisu also charged auditors to perform their duties with the utmost professionalism, independence, objectivity, courage, and a high sense of patriotism.

Dr. Kumah made these statements when he was speaking at the closing ceremony of the Internal Audit Conference organized by the IAA in Accra on the theme: “Injecting fiscal discipline into resource mobilization and utilization for sustainable development: The role of internal auditors.”

The three-day conference was attended by internal auditors from across the country and was graced by Individuals, agencies, and institutions who distinguished themselves in their work were honored.

The Deputy Minister in his statement, further said that auditors must not compromise standards, adding “there is a direct correlation between an effective internal audit function and accelerated economic development of our country. And it’s for this reason that I urge you all to put the country first in your job”.

Dr. Kumah explained that the Akufo-Addo-led government is embarking on a restructuring program to strengthen the internal audit service to help prevent corruption and also ensure efficiency in the use of public funds.

He explained that Ghana is currently experiencing its fair share of the global economic challenges, which are manifested among other things, in high inflation, pressure on our currency and difficulties with raising adequate domestic revenue.

According to him, "This situation has called for extraordinary measures instituted by government aimed at mitigating the depreciation of the Cedi, ensuring expenditure discipline, and providing relief in the face of the global fuel price hikes and inflation as well as ensuring that priority programmes meant to grow the economy are protected".

" These included; a 30% cut in discretionary expenditure, A 50% cut in fuel coupon allocations for all political appointees and Heads of government institutions, including SOEs, A complete moratorium on the purchase of imported vehicles for the rest of the year, measures to eliminate “ghost” workers from the Government payroll by end of December 2022, Reduce expenditure on all meetings and conferences by 50%, Pursue a comprehensive re-profiling strategy to reduce the interest expense burden on the fiscal".

He said per the measures to improve the revenue mobilisation been put in place by the Ghana Revenue Authority the domestic revenue mobilization and improve the revenue to GDP ratio for Ghana will increase from the current 13% to the 20% target by 2023.

Dr. Kumah also assure the public that government will continue to support the work of auditors in their Assurance services they offer, including the work of the Auditor General in the publication of his reports on the audit of public funds.

He express that in the recent report of the Auditor General for instance for 2021, the total value of irregularities reported is GHS 1,080,931,937 from a previous year's reported amount of GHS 2,053,176,449.8 in 2020.

"This indicates a GHS972,244,512.85 (representing 47.35%) reduction in the value of previously reported infractions and a cumulative average reduction in the value of infractions from GHS5,196,043,399.94 in 2018 to GHS1,080,931,937 in 2021, representing 79.19% reduction. This shows a declining trend in the financial impact of the reported irregularities from 2018 to 2021" he added.

The Deputy Minister added that the the programme would also enable the service to effectively play its role in the ongoing public financial management reforms by the government.

He further charged the Director-General of IAA to continue pursuing measures to reduce infractions reported by the Auditor-General and to ensure that defaulting individuals, agencies, and MMDAs complied with their expenditure requirements.

Corporate governance

The Director-General of the State Interest and Governance Authority (SIGA), Edward Boateng, on his part also emphasized the need for auditors to strengthen corporate governance practices in their respective institutions.

He said ensuring discipline, enforcing ruless and implementing laid down statutory procedures were key ingredients to strengthening corporate governance.

Mr. Boateng however, urged the auditors to be bold in discharging their duties, especially in institutions where some chief executive officers did not want to be audited.