How MDAs shortchanged Nigeria N4trn - AGF

THE Office of the Auditor General of the Federation (AGF) has revealed how various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) shortchanged the nation to the tune of over N4 trillion in its report for 2009 fiscal year.
The report, obtained by the Nigerian Tribune in Abuja, detailed how the MDAs failed to remit the N4 trillion to the Federal Government’s coffers.
In the report, 93 out of 108 MDAs failed to disclose the nature of accounts with closing balances totalling N422,374,981,449.18 in 2009 fiscal year, while the sum of N22,941,514,567, being “cash held from external loans,” had no comparative figure.
The AGF, Mr Samuel Ukura, signed the 399-page audit report, which covers the accounts of the Federal Government for 2009 and detailed how the Consolidated Revenue Account recorded a shortfall sum of N254,157,683,917.45; shortfall of N267,674,270,493.54 in the external loan out of N582,621,480,000 obtained by Fund Departments and $200 million transfer from JP Morgan, which was omitted from the Consolidated Account as of August 13, 2009.
According to the report, the sum of N214,826,243,694 accrued into sinking fund, interest due on floatation of bonds, among others were unknown, while N524,372,523,275.79 extracted balances on capital accounts of 185 MDAs had not been remitted into the Consolidated Revenue Fund.
The report also showed that the sum of N109,449,999,997 was paid from Consolidate revenue Fund accounts into retire-ment benefit bond redem-ption fund from 2006 to 2009 without evidence of investments, as provided in Section 29(1) of the 2004 Pension Reform Act, which requires the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to estab-lish, invest and manage the fund.
Another issue raised by the report was the non-repayment of sum of N306,538,058,709.32, out of which N149,965,780,369 loans and cumulative interests for 2009 fiscal year owed by 18 MDAs to various companies; N7,291,336,930.09 principal loans and N1,096,183,863 cumulative interests owed by Federal Housing Authority (FHA) since 2002.