By: Kebba AF Touray
The Finance and Public Accounts Committee of the Assembly (FPAC) on Wednesday, 15 November recommended that the Inspector General of Police investigate unresolved resolutions worth over one hundred and thirty-nine million Dalasi (D139,000).
They made this recommendation during the engagement with the National Audit Office (NAO), Accountant General Department (AGD), Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs (MoFEA) and FPAC on its resolutions passed during the last ordinary session of the assembly on the COVID-19 Audit Report.
The interface was meant for the NAO and the AG to brief the FPAC on the submissions reviewed and provides updates to the committee on the unretired imprests.
During the interface, FPAC engaged the said entities on the aforesaid matters especially on its resolutions on the COVID-19 Fund, where it was discovered that some of the resolutions such as that of on the COVID-19 Fund were not resolved.
The resolutions of FPAC deal with unresolved monies of over one hundred million dalasi.
FPAC reveals “that the Executive Director of National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA) must account for all undelivered food items worth over D100 Million on or before the 25 September 2023 to the AGD and notify FPAC; that the Executive Director of NDMA to account for the shortage of delivery of oil by the International Commodity Insurance worth GMD37, 653,700.00 and the money be deposited to the National Treasury on or before the 25th September 2023 and notify AGD and FPAC.”
It added: “The Permanent Secretary Ministry of Health must produce the missing payment voucher in respect of the payment of GMD 1,650,000.00 to the AG and the on or before 25th September 2023; The Permanent Secretary Ministry of Health must recover the sum of GMD1, 165,548.00 being an overpayment to COVID-19 Frontline Workers and pay the sum to the AGD and notify the Auditor General and FPAC on or before 25th September 2023.
“The Director General Gambia Tourism Board (GT Board) must account for the GMD202, 000.00 being difference of monies received from the Government for the payment to individuals in the informal sector, on or before 25th September 2023; and the Grant Management Committee (GMC) and Gambia Press Union (GPU) must return to the AGD the sum of GMD585,159.86 being the unused funds for the COVID-19 Relief support to media houses, on or before 25th September 2023.”
All the mentioned resolutions on unresolved monies of FPAC if accumulated will amount to over one hundred and thirty-nine million dalasi (D139M), and were past during the last ordinary session of the Assembly, and the concerned institutions were given until 25th September 2023 within which they supposed to resolve the resolutions.
However, during the said interface FPAC discovered that the said resolutions remained as they were when the committee passed the resolution, as such FPAC has referred the matters to the Inspector General of the Gambia Police to probe into the issues.
It was during the interface that FPAC and the said entities discovered that handful of the resolutions such as on alleged fraudulent cases detected at the GCCPC, outstanding documents on retirement of the COVID-19 Funs by the Gambian embassy in Madrid, PURA’s status update about the levied-on Jah Oil with supporting documents, and AG’s responses on audit queries contained in the FPAC reports on audited Government Accounts among other resolutions were all resolved.
Engagement between the AGD, NAO and FPAC continues today Thursday 16th November 2023 in the morning at the Legislative House in Banjul
