*Summons AGF
By Ignatius Okorocha
Alarmed at the increasing deficit incurred annually in the nation’s budgetary process despite the introduction of Treasury Single Account (TSA) policy, Senate yesterday vowed to employ the services of external Auditors to unravel what has happened to the funds generated by all revenue generating Agencies of government.
This is even as the Senate committee on Finance has resolved to invite the office of Accountant General of the Federation (AGF) to brief it on the financial state of the revenue generating agencies of government.
Making this disclosure at a media briefing in Abuja, chairman of the Senate committee on Finance, Senator Solomon Adeola (Lagos West), lamented that there had not been any accurate account of the proceeds from the TSA since inception.
He said,”We are seeking the assistance of an international Auditor to give us the true position of the of Treasury Single Account (TSA) from inception to date.
“We have Agencies that are concerned with how much was generated and how much was disbursed. It is only good that Agency that received the money which is the central bank of Nigeria (CBN) on behalf of the revenue generating agencies.
“The Accountant General of Federation who is saddled with the responsibility of ensuring that this revenue actually goes in into the apex bank. It is only proper for us to ask for a reconciliation of that particular account through an independent Auditor not Auditor of the federal Republic of Nigeria.”
Continuing he said that “If we have the account, it would serve as key guidance for us to look into the activities of all the revenue Agencies because the agencies may come to us and claim that they have put in about N5billion and at the end of the day they should tell us how the account was expended. All approval that was given who gave the approval, how much was actually left in that particular account as at today.
“So all here and much are w we will be finding out. To start with we are gong to invite the Accountant General of the Federation ( AGF) to come before the committee of the Finance to tell us the state of affairs of the TSA and tell us the total reconciliation of the audit and get back to us in a month or one and half month.
“We will continue to collect our information and data from all the revenue collecting agencies to guide our line of though and joking us in this investigative hearing which we will be conducting include fiscal responsibility office and the office of AGF because any information generated by any of this generating agencies would be corroborated by these two offices.”
According to Adeola: “The aim of this investigation is to unravel why year in and year out we have huge revenue deficit. Like this year we have about N6trillion and for us to have this budget we have engaged in excessive borrowing.
“If we must get what belongs to government through this revenue generating agencies it may lead us to running our budget with less deficit and also cut down on borrowing.
We are outing in place the next five to seven month to carry out this exercise.”
