Dr Jackson Okpachui, the Chairman, Forum of Heads of Internal Audit of Federal Tertiary Health Institutions has urged auditors in Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) to have departments in the presidency to check their excesses.
Okpachui made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Calabar on Tuesday.
The chairman said since 2013, there had been advocacy for internal audit units in federal institutions to have a department in the presidency to enable the Federal Government to check the excesses in those institutions.
“We don’t need a doctor to come and diagnose our institutions, the best persons to do that are the internal auditors but they are still subject to their employers and are not independent to ensure accuracy.
“These employers can fire the auditor if his report is not favourable to them and by so doing, we cannot top corruption.
“The only way we can solve this problem of mismanagement and corruption in our institutions is through the enactment of a law directing internal audit to report directly to the presidency; if you do that, no auditor will be fired for doing his job well.
“On the other hand, these auditors will become the eyes of the presidency to monitor what is going on in the MDAs thereby reducing corruption,” Okpachui said.
He called on the Accountant-General of the Federation to mandate the Chief Accounting Officers of MDAs to give access to their internal auditors to review transactions on Government Integrated Financial and Management Information System (GIFMIS) and Integrated Payroll and Personal Information Systems (IPPIS).