FRC to publish MDAs that falter on rendition of financial statements –Obazze

BY AMECHI OGBONNA

As part of measures to strengthen ac­countability and enhance transparency in public sector administra­tion, the Financial Report­ing Council (FRC), last weekend, hinted it would commence the publication of names and identities of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government that fail to publish their au­dited financial statements in line with the provisions of the council’s Act.

Speaking at the annual retreat for reporters and business editors in Lagos, the Executive Secretary and Chief Executive of FRC, Mr. Jim Obazze, said the idea was to ensure that corporate governance principles and transparency enshrined in the FRC Act in respect of public and private sector entities are observed and fully complied with by managers of such or­ganisations.

According to him, recent reviews done by the FRC reveal that only a few gov­ernment agencies have up to date financial statements due to their lack of techni­cal manpower to analyse fi­nancial reports, adding that such institutions may have to urgently train their man­power to be able to comply with requirements of the law on public sector account­ing since the FRC would no longer condone abuse of the provisions of its law.

Commenting on the imple­mentation of the Internation­al Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS), he point­ed out that only Lagos out of the 36 states of the federation has been able to get it right so far, warning that those that have not complied may face some stringent sanc­tions from 2015, particularly as the Federal Government was already in the process of gazzeting the directive.

Obazze stated: “We have strict penalties for corporate governance breaches but we are also exposing this to Ni­gerian public to make their comments.”

The FRC boss noted that not-for-profit organisations like churches have been given one year waiver in line with their request to put their houses in order and thereaf­ter begin rendition of their financial reports in line with the demands of the law.

The Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN) is a unified independent reg­ulatory body for accounting, auditing, actuarial, valuation and corporate governance practices in public and pri­vate sectors of the Nigerian economy.

It was set up to address current institutional weak­nesses in regulation, com­pliance and enforcement of standards and the develop­ment of robust arrangements for monitoring and enforcing compliance with financial re­porting standards in Nigeria.

Source : SunOnline