Audit Report (SL0016)

Status quo or problem/ issue to be addressed
Majority of the recommendations of the Auditor General's report were not implemented and public officials most times go unpunished resulting in the loss of government resources which would have been used to provide services for the people of Sierra Leone. Also, the report of the PAC on the Auditor General’s report is not made available online.
Main objective
Increase compliance with audit measures to improve transparency and accountability in public resource spending
Brief Description of Commitment (140 character limit)
This commitment seeks to improve compliance with procurement related recommendations from the Audit Service and the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee report published online.

Commitment 5. Auditor’s General Report

Commitment Text:

This commitment seeks to improve compliance with procurement related recommendations from the Audit Service and the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee report published online.

Milestones:

1. 3 ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), (MOHS, MHWI and MOFED) implement 50% of procurement related recommendation of the Auditor General’s reports 2014 and 2015 and the Audit Service publish the status of the recommendation in their audit report
2. MDAs to develop and publish action plans that outlines specific ways each will implement the recommendations on procurement. Each plan should be submitted together with the progress report on the implementation of the recommendation of the 2014 Auditor General’s report
3. 50% of the special procurement audit reports conducted by the Audit Service Sierra Leone for 2015 implemented by MEST and MAFFS
4. Publish the reports of the 2014 and 2015 Parliamentary Audit Committees online.

Responsible institution: Audit Service.

Supporting institution(s): Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, Ministry of Housing, Works, and Infrastructure, Anti-Corruption Commission, Performance Management and Service Delivery, Transparency International, Budget Advocacy Network, Education for All, National Youth Coalition, and Network Movement for Justice and Development.

Start date: July 2016                                                                                  End date: June 2018

Commitment Aim:

This commitment aimed to expand audit recommendations. The Auditor General’s annual audit report always contains recommendations, but public institutions rarely implement these suggestions.

Status

Midterm: Not started

There was no progress on the commitment by the midterm. The Audit Service could not provide details on the rate at which MDAs had implemented audit recommendations (Milestones1 and 3). MDAs did not submit plans on how audit recommendations would be implemented to the Audit Department (Milestone 2). At the midterm, the 2014 and 2015 Parliamentary Audit Committee reports were not published online (Milestone 4). For more information, please see the 2016−2018 midterm report. [39]

End of term: Not started

Milestone 1: After the midterm, the Audit Service published the 2017 audit of government institutions. The report did not contain information on the rate at which MDAs had implemented 2014 and 2015 audit recommendations. [40]

Milestone 2: MDAs did not submit to the audit service their plans on how audit recommendations would be implemented. An official of the Network Movement For Justice and Development, a CSO involved with this commitment, confirmed this. [41]

Milestone 3: According to the 2016 audit report, the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament deliberated the Auditor General’s main 2014 accounts. [42] However, a report of this deliberation was not published online, as required by the commitment.

Milestone 4: The researcher discovered that MDAs did not develop and publish action plans outlining their implementation of procurement recommendations nor did they publish reports on implementing recommendations from the 2014 Auditor General’s report.

Milestone 5: The Annual Report on the Accounts of Sierra Leone (2016) did not report the implementation of suggestions from the Audit Service for 2015 procurements. [43] The Annual Report on the Accounts of Sierra Leone (2017) was unavailable at the time of this report. Therefore, the researcher could not access whether the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Agriculture implemented 50% of the special procurement audit reports conducted by the Audit Service Sierra Leone for 2015.

Milestone 6: The Parliamentary Audit Committee reports of the 2014 and 2015 audit report were not published online.

Did it open government?

Access to information: Did not change

The Auditor General’s annual audit report contains recommendations on improving management of public funds; however, public institutions rarely implement these changes. The aim of the commitment was to increase public institutions’ implementation of audit recommendations by having institutions publish their progress. Milestones 1, 3, 5, and 6 would have made information on institutions’ compliance more available to the public. However, these milestones were not implemented. Therefore, the commitment did not improve institutions’ implementation of audit recommendations.

Carried forward?

The government had not released the third action plan at the time of this report. The commitment should not be carried forward as it had little success in the prior two plans.

[39] Charlie Hughes, Sierra Leone Mid-Term Report 2016-2018 (OGP, 9 Jul. 2018), https://www.opengovpartnership.org/documents/sierra-leone-mid-term-report-2016-2018-year-1/.

[40] Audit Service, Auditor General Annual Report, https://www.auditservice.gov.sl/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/assl-auditor-general-annual-report-2016.pdf

[41] Head of Programs, Network Movement for Justice and Development, interview with IRM researcher, 3 Sept. 2018.

[42] Short cite for fn 2, xxi.

[43] Short cite for fn 2.