By: Kebba AF Touray
Donal Charles Kaye, Senior Partner of the PKF, thanked FPAC for affording them the opportunity to meet with the committee and hear from them what exactly transpired, since there are always two sides to an issue.
He made these remarks on Wednesday 7th February, 2024, during their interface with the FPAC to iron out their failure to appear at the National Assembly as scheduled on Thursday 1st February, 2024.
The interface was meant to hear from the PKF on why they failed to appear on Thursday during the presentation of the activity reports and financial statements of the Gambia Investment and Export Promotion Agency (GIEPA).
In making their submission on the matter, Kaye said as much as any organization knows the internal work it is faced with, it is the same with the PKF.
He said: “We will never ever be contemptuous of any committee, an individual, organization and much more to a sovereign state. It is not our values. We will never be contemptuous. Those who know us and work with us can tell you of the ideals that we seek in this area that we operate. I can assure you.”
He added that it is the same ideals that they had committed to in January well before they got the notification of the meeting, saying “I can assure you we have never been contemptuous and we will never be.”
He averred that over the years, in all their engagements with the committee they have never sent an assistant but rather their head, which is in line with their governance structure, adding that they only send an assistant if the head is out of the jurisdiction.
“We did meet with the NAO and put to them our recommendations for how misunderstanding such as this can happen, because it is rather unfortunate for all that has happened, it is just an unfortunate situation and those who have worked with us (including two subject matter specialists of FPAC) will tell you it is not our values,” he said.
“In whatever submissions we make as a firm, we have been dealing with reports, we have been guided that justice should guide our actions for the common good because we know exactly the consequences of the work that we do,” he told FPAC.
Sherign Mass Jallow described the situation as totally sorrowful and remorseful, culminating with the need to go back to the drawing board (FPAC) to give PKF the opportunity to make its case before regarding the unfortunate situation that had happened.
He stated that they would not dictate the manner in which FPAC should do their proceedings, but rather to provide them with ample evidence pertaining to decisions that FPAC would take.
Hon. Kebba Lang Fofanna, deputizing for the FPAC Chairperson, told PKF that having listened to their submissions, the committee wanted to thank PKF for the initiative and for coming before the FPAC and representing the PKF audit firm.
