2022 budget: Reps C’ttee canvass for financial autonomy for Office of Auditor General of the Federation

The Public Accounts Committee , PAC, of the House of Representatives is canvassing for both administrative and financial autonomy for the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation, OAuGF because of its functions and transparency.

The Chairman of the Committee, Hon Busayo Oluwole Oke, (PDP-Osun) disclosed in Abuja on Thursday at the 2022 Budget Defence exercise of the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation.

Hon. Oke who said that a bill being sponsored by him before the House which had already passed the second reading lamented that caging the operations of the all important Office through financial and administrative control eroded transparency and accountability.

He cited instances such as when from the Auditor General’s Report, it was established that between 2013 and 2020, a sum of N7 trillion was expended from the service wide vote on the OAuGF, parastatals and agencies under it, without the Office of the Auditor General feeling any impact or having any knowledge of such expenditure.

Hon. Oke noted that such a serious infraction on the part of the Executive arm of government that controls the vote would have been followed to its logical conclusion if the OAuGF had been autonomous in every aspect.

The Committee Chairman then advised the OAuGF to embark on intensive lobby to effect an increase in its annual budgetary allocations and assured that the committee would liaise with the House Leadership with a view to placing the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation on the First Line Charge in budgetary funding.

Hon Wole Oke then announced the constitution of a 7-man sub committee, headed by Committee’s Deputy chairman with members drawn from the six geo-political zones in the country to work together with OAuGF office towards producing a tenable report that would expeditiously facilitate the direct funding of the Office.

Earlier, the Auditor-General of the Federation Mr Adolphus Aghughu had announced a proposed budget of N9.64 billion for the year 2022 if the Office must function optimally.