Auditor General to audit COVID-19 expenditure

ISLAMABAD: The Auditor General of Pakistan has decided to audit all the COVID-19 related expenditure.

Since the COVID-19 outbreak in Pakistan in February 2020, the role of the Auditor General of Pakistan has become very important to supporting the government response mechanisms by maintaining public financial management discipline and ensuring transparency and accountability.

For a timely input to the legislature and the executive, the DAGP plans to produce several short and quick reports on the COVID-19 expenditure to assist the government in its drive against the deadly pandemic.

Chairing a meeting here to discuss the audit strategy, Auditor General of Pakistan Javaid Jehangir stressed that all the field officers, including the Director General Audit (Climate Change & Environment) Director General (Social Safety Nets), should act in a coordinated manner to produce quality audit reports on Covid-19 related expenditure.

He said the audit assumed more importance keeping in view the expectations of the stakeholders such as the parliament, the media, the public and the government(s), and their interest in knowing whether the COVID funds were being spent in a transparent and efficient manner.

Additional AGP-I&II, all DAGs and DGs of Field Audit Offices dealing with COVID audit attended the meeting. It was decided in the meeting that the audit officers (FAOs) would comprehensively cover all the possible areas of COVID related expenditure including procurement of goods and services, advertisements, storage, relief funds, quarantine centers, services by hospitals and public health institution, testing, ration procurements and distribution etc.

The auditor general further emphasized that audit considerations arising from changes due to pandemic (COVID-19 should be taken into account by the FAOs. Impact on the planned audit approach of new or revised risks that have arisen because of COVID-19, including revision of risk assessments of the entities and responding to the assessed risks, will be a key factor in success of the audit assignments.

Moreover, using new or flexing the use of existing IT resources in the current circumstances of the pandemic (use of ACL, CAATs etc.) will make the audit activity more productive and result-oriented.