How Accountant General failed to disclose N57.6bn grants -Report

Accountant General of the Federation, AGF, Ahmed Idris is presently under fire over his alleged failure to disclose details of N57.6 billion federal government grants.

This was revealed by the 2017 report of Office of Auditor General of the Federation before the Senate Committee on Public Accounts, chaired by Senator Mathew Urhoghide (PDP Edo South), which is presently carrying out investigative hearing on accounts of some government ministries, departments and agencies, MDAs in the country.

The federal government had in 2017 released the grants to state governments, privately owned companies, government owned companies and as contributions to international organisations, among others.

For failure to disclose the grants, the Office of Auditor General of the Federation, OAuGF, issued a query to the AGF, which the Senate panel sustained during its investigative hearing at the weekend in Abuja.

The query reads: “Examination of Note 14 (Grants and Contributions), as well as the Statement of Financial Performance revealed the following:

“The budgetary provision for grants and contribution was not disclosed in the
notes to the accounts. This contravenes the provisions of IPSAS 24 (Presentation of Budget Information in Financial Statements).

“The sum of ₦57,624,929,461.05 (Fifty-seven billion, six hundred and twenty-
four million, nine hundred and twenty-nine thousand, four hundred and sixty-
one naira, five kobo) was granted by the Federal Government of Nigeria as
grants and contribution which represent transfers to domestic and foreign
governments, public and private owned companies, academic institutions
and internationals for 2017.

“The breakdown and details of grants and contributions were not presented for audit.

“Non disclosure of details of Federal Government Grants and Contributions
will cast doubt on the authenticity and actual usage of such grants and contributions.

“The incomplete disclosure of budgeted figures may result in extra-budgetary
expenditures.

“The Accountant-General was requested to disclose beneficiaries of grants and
contributions for the year 2017.

“In his response, the Accountant-General stated that the list of beneficiaries of grants and contributions in the period under audit would be made available on Monday, 18th March, 2019 but no list or details was received as at the time of this report.

“The Accountant-General is required to disclose the budget and beneficiaries of grants and contributions for the year 2017.”

The AGF, represented by Segun Fehintola, however, failed to present any documents before the Senate committee showing the beneficiaries of the N57.6 billion two years after he had promised to make it available.

But he promised that details of the disbursement will be made available at the next sitting of the committee this week.

Irked by the AGF’s response, chairman of the committee stated that the observation of the Auditor General was genuine and sustained the query, insisting that details of the beneficiaries of the grants must be presented at the next sitting.

“We must sustain this query,because the observation was genuine and you must bring the details of beneficiaries of the grants to committee for vetting at the next public hearing,” Senator Urhoghide said.