In the bid to tackle corruption in the
civil service, President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered that all audit
queries must henceforth be answered within 24 hours.
The President has also directed the
Auditor General of the Federation to resolve all outstanding audit
queries within the next 30 days.
The order was contained in a statement
made available to journalists on Sunday by the Senior Special Assistant
to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu.
He said the orders followed the
President’s displeasure in hearing that audit queries remained
unanswered for long periods, sometimes running into years, under
previous administrations.
He said Buhari was committed to tackling administrative and bureaucratic corruption.
The statement read, “The era of impunity is gone. The President is taking the war on corruption to the civil service.
“He is not happy that standard operating procedures and financial regulations are no longer being observed as they should.
“President Buhari will ensure that
public officials and civil servants in the service of the Federal
Government pay a heavy price from now on for violating financial
regulations or disregarding audit queries.
“On his watch, President Buhari wants to
see firm action against those who violate extant financial regulations,
not the prevarication and shenanigans that went on in the past in the
form of endless probes and public inquiries.”
Shehu added that the President was
determined to put an end to the present situation in which, rather than
respond to legitimate audit queries, violators of financial regulations
in the Federal Government resort to threatening, bribing or mounting
other forms of social pressure on auditors.
PUNCH