Discussions unfolded within the 24th exchange forum between the National Assembly and the Audit Bench of the Supreme Court.
Members of the Finance and Budget Committee of the National Assembly and those of the Audit Bench of the Supreme Court have exchanged on the role played by the latter and other persons from the parliament in the management of regional and local councils. Chairing the meeting, Hon Rosette Ayayi, president of the finance and budget committee while opening deliberations hailed the initiative, saying it would enable them to acquire skills and knowledge to ease the follow up of public finance.
To keep MPs informed on the subject, the Audit Bench found it worthwhile to first emphasise the responsibility of actors in the budgetary and accounting chain. From the report of the audit bench, an information system will be established in collaboration with Minddevel, Minfi and PNDP. This will concern he inventory of all regional and local authorities, the directory of mayors, councils and regional treasurers and finance controllers and the system of updating and enriching accounting, financial and economic information which serves as an instrument of improving the governance of local authorities.
Last year, Justice Justine Fofung, acting president of the Audit Bench during a similar forum in her presentation on the “Evolution of the Jurisdiction of the Audit Bench and its Impact on the Management of Regional and Local Authorities,” said only 16 out of the 374 councils in the country submitted their audited reports to her office in 2016. And between 2004 and 2017, councils failed to submit a whooping 3,700 audited accounts to her office. Then, she had attributed the laxity on the part of council treasurers in submitting audited accounts to her office as required by statutes to the absence of a law making any failure to do so a punishable offence.
The exchange forum held at a time the decentralization process was making significant progress with the increased transfer of competences and resources to local authorities.
Claudette CHIN
