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Auditor General explains delay in MoH audit

Auditor General explains delay in MoH audit
Written by George Chellah
Tuesday, June 23, 2009 5:25:19 PM

AUDITOR General Anna Chifungula on Friday revealed that the forensic audit in the K27 billion scam at the Ministry of Health (MoH) has delayed because most of the documents are missing at the ministry headquarters.

And Chifungula said the forensic audit for Lusaka Province should be concluded by the end of the month. In an interview, Chifungula said the forensic audit at the Ministry of Health was still in progress.

"They are still on going, the problem we have had is because of the lack of audit trail. Most of the documents are missing from the ministry so now you have to start building from other sources and that will take a bit of more time. It does take time because now you are scrutinizing other things as well," Chifungula explained.

"The documents are not available at the ministry, they are missing and that has delayed the audit because the auditors have to look at other means to get the information."

However, she said the audit in Lusaka would be concluded by the end of the month.

"We have to proceed to other provinces as well. But for Lusaka we should be through by the end of the month," Chifungula said.

Asked whether the amount of money misappropriated at the Ministry of Health still stood at K27 billion, Chifungula responded: "That I can't say now because the audit is still going on."

Last month, Chifungula revealed that preliminary investigations at the Ministry of Health indicated that K27 billion was stolen and there was a possibility that more money might have been stolen by civil servants.

She said the amounts of money stolen from the Ministry of Health were much higher than the initially reported K10 billion.

"Well, for us we have found that K27 billion was stolen," Chifungula said.

Asked if there was a possibility that the money stolen was more than what the investigations had so far revealed, Chifungula responded: "Yes, there are possibilities that the amount might be higher than that. There are some other figures that are still...you know the investigation is still going on. So the ones that have been confirmed is K27 billion."

Later, Secretary of the Cabinet Dr Joshua Kanganja announced that 32 workers from the Ministry of Health had been sent on forced leave.

Dr Kanganja said the affected workers would be liable for prosecution if investigations proved that they had abused public funds.

Initially, the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) unearthed a corruption scam in which over K10 billion government funds were suspected to have been corruptly obtained from the Ministry of Health.

The commission investigated Henry Kapoko, a former human resource manager in the Ministry of Health, in connection with the alleged corruption, theft and fraud.

The ACC also seized and restricted property in excess of K3 billion allegedly belonging to Kapoko who now works at the Ministry of Local Government and Housing in the human resource department.

Kapoko, six other civil servants from the Ministry of Health and a businessman are currently facing charges before the courts of law.

Following the revelations of corruption, the governments of Sweden and Netherlands suspended aid to Zambia's health sector pending the outcome of the investigations at the ministry.

According to the donors, the abuse of their taxpayers' money was unacceptable. Donor assistance to the Ministry of Health stands at 55 per cent.

Labels: ANNA CHIFUNGULA, AUDITOR GENERAL, CORRUPTION, MINISTRY OF HEALTH

posted by MrK @ 4:25 PM