The Audit report carried out by the office of Auditor General for the federation has indicted the management of the Federal Medical Centre, Owo, Ondo state of mismanaging a sum N167.5M
The development that contravened the Financial Regulations (FR) (2009) in handling the funds the institution generated and those allocated to it by the government, the 2019 government audit has revealed.
The hospital managers mishandled the said amount according to the audit.
The management of the hospital have been ordered by the Auditor General of the Federation to provide reasons for the infractions before relevant authorities, return the funds to the government treasury or face sanctions.
Auditor-General for the Federation Adolphus Aghughu signed the audit report titled, ‘Auditor-General for the Federation’s Annual Report on Non-compliance/Internal Control Weaknesses Issues in Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government of Nigeria for the Year Ended December 31 2019.’
Some of the infringements include: the award of contracts above the approval threshold of the chief medical director, non-deduction of one per cent stamp duty from contractors, unretired personal advances, payment without relevant supporting documents, and refusal to remit internally-generated revenues.
Others are: a violation of government e-payment policy, refusal to take items on store ledger charge, non-retirement of cash advances, and direct procurement without the approval of the Bureau of Public Procurement.
The audit report indicted FMC Owo of non-remittance of 25 per cent internally-generated revenue amounting to N11.5 million.
The audit notes that the hospital generated N46.3 million in 2019 as non-revolving Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). There was no evidence of remittance of 25 per cent of the IGR as required by the extant laws. The hospital should remit N11.5 million from the fund, the audit says.
The FMC paid a 15 per cent mobilisation fee of N21.3 million without submitting an advance payment guarantee (APG) by benefitting contractors.
In 2019, three contractors got N21.3 million from the institution for various projects, and the FMC failed to submit the APG.
The audit also accuses the hospital of approving contracts above the threshold of the chief medical director to the tune of N120.9 million.
Audit observes that the chief medical director solely approved the award of contracts (amounting to N120.9 million) that year without recourse to the Tender’s Board, which has the authority for approval as required by extant regulations.
The institution also failed to deduct N2.2 million as one per cent stamp duty from its contractors.
The amount is from the N225.8 million paid to contractors for various contracts.
Besides, the facility did not retire personal advances, totalling N11.4 million.
“There was no evidence to show that the amount was retired as at the time of audit in February 2020 contrary to extant regulations, and there were cases of multiple personal advances without retiring previous advances granted to some of the staff,” the report states.
The audit accuses the organisation of making N5.2 million payments for contracts without relevant supporting documents.
