National
OAG fails to audit transactions of six local units
Six local federal units and around 100 erstwhile local bodies that have become part of the newly carved out local units have failed to get their financial transactions audited by the Office of the Auditor General this fiscal year, OAG officials said.Prithvi Man Shrestha
Six local federal units and around 100 erstwhile local bodies that have become part of the newly carved out local units have failed to get their financial transactions audited by the Office of the Auditor General this fiscal year, OAG officials said.
The OAG started auditing the local governments’ transactions beginning the current fiscal year after the constitution authorised it to check the finances of the local units.
According to the OAG, audits of the local bodies under previous structure and the new set-up go parallel.
In the first year, the office was unable to audit the finances of all the local units due to their failure to provide details of transactions, officials said. The audit was of the transactions made in the fiscal year 2016-17.
“Auditing of the financial transactions of six new local units in Mahottari district—Gaushala Municipality, Pipara, Manara, Mahottari, Loharpatti and Samsi rural municipalities, could not happen,” said Assistant Auditor General Maheshwor Kafle.
“The number reaches 100 if we include the Village Development Committees and municipalities under the previous local structure.”
It means the OAG was able to audit dealings of last fiscal year at 738 out of the 744 local units while the transactions of many political units were audited partially. There are 753 local units across the country, after additional local units were created in the current fiscal year during the local level elections held last year.
Although the constitution authorises the OAG to issue necessary directives for conducting audits of the government agencies, it failed to ensure that transactions of all the local bodies are audited.
Article 241 of the constitution says: the Auditor General shall, at all times, have power to examine any books of accounts for the purpose of carrying out its functions. “It shall be the duty of the concerned chief of office to provide all such documents and information as may be demanded by the auditor general or any of his or her employees.”
But OAG officials said they had no access to documents sought from the said local units although the OAG wrote to them demanding details. “We also wrote to the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development to help acquire details from the local units,” said Kafle.
According to the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration, which was transformed from the MoFALD, the transitional situation of the local units made it difficult to provide details of financial transactions.
Dinesh Thapaliya, secretary at the ministry, said the government’s failure to send the account chief to the local units on time, to complete internal audits and to assimilate old and new transaction details after the new local units were created barred some local units from getting their transactions audited. “We’re still working to ensure that their transactions are also audited by the OAG soon,” he said.
As the local units were formed on March 10, 2017, the OAG had to conduct audits of local bodies under the old and new structures separately. “We later merged them to create single audit of new local units,” said Uddav Chandra Shrestha, spokesperson of the OAG.