...Claiming it pay Universities students (Ghost Students)
The Auditor General of the Federation in its latest report has uncovered a withdrawal of over N6 billion without due auditing processes being followed, including payment of tuition fees to various universities for non-existent students under the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP).
The findings, disclosed in the Auditor-General’s Annual Report on Non-Compliance and Internal Control Weaknesses, highlight government funds’ waste and public funds’ diversion between 2020 and 2021.
A breakdown of the N6bn, according to the report, showed that N1.53 billion was paid as tuition fees without relevant supporting documents attached to the paid vouchers.
Paragraph 708 of the Financial Regulations, 2009 states that “On no account should payment be made for services not yet performed or for goods not yet supplied.”
Furthermore, paragraph 603(i) of the FR 2009 states “All vouchers shall contain full particulars of each service. Such as dates, numbers, quantities, distances and rates, so as to enable them to be checked without reference to any other documents and will invariably be supported by relevant documents such as local purchases, orders, special letters of authority, time sheets etc”.
However, the audit observed widespread breaches of these provisions.
“The sum of N1.529, 669, 500 were paid to various universities as tuition fees for students under PAP and relevant supporting documents such as receipts, evidence of payments, admission letter, etc were not attached to the paid vouchers,” the report wrote in part.
The report attributed the anomalies to weakness in the international control system at the PAP Abuja, adding that it had reached out to the management of the PAP, however, got no response from them.
In the same vein, the report said a total of N3.62bn was raised without an internal audit check.
It said the PAP authorities did not provide a reason for non-compliance with the provisions of the extant regulations on internal audit checks were not provided, leading to the loss of public funds and unapproved payments.
The AuG also said it got no response from the management of the PAP.
The sum of N1.3bn was also approved, paid and entered into the cash book without raising paid vouchers.
A further peruse of the report also saw the sum of N29 million granted as cash advances to officers of the programme for procurement of goods and services above the advances limit of N200,000.
“Some officers were granted multiple advances without evidence of retiring previous advances granted them, contrary to the previous extant regulations,” the report added.
The sum of N87.7m was also paid for the purchase of various store items and “there was no evidence provided to show that the items were taken on store ledger charge,” the report said.
“Since the management failed to respond to the issue raised, the findings remain valid until the management implements the recommendations,” the AuG wrote in its evaluation.
It recommended that the interim administration of the PAP should be requested to justify to the National Assembly why it made such payment without supporting documents, recover and remit to treasury the mismanaged fund, and forward evidence of remittance to the Public Accounts Committees of the National Assembly.
It also recommended other sanctions relating to irregular payments prescribed in paragraph 3106 of the Financial Regulations, 2009.
