Updated: 06:45:19
Forensic auditing is a specialization within the field of accounting, and forensic auditors often provide expert testimony during trial proceedings. To put it simply Baker Tilly auditors were hired by the Joyce Banda government and the British Government to conduct a criminal investigation, the suspected crime was misallocation of Tax payer’s money through the much touted IFMIS – Central payment system.
Therefore it should be understood Baker Tilly was empowered by Our Government and our Colonial Master the Brits to turn over every rock so that they could uncover the perpetrators of the Cashgate crimes and bring all of them to justice including those that would hinder or slow that investigation.
Reading the Report however one comes out feeling that Our Government led by President Joyce Banda and the Brits and the Baker Tilly auditors were never in search of the truth. The whole exercise was to fool the Malawi tax payers and the Donor community that something was being done when the outcome was predetermined.
The report was meant to exonerate people instead of finding the guilty.
At the Very top of the report the Auditors admit they run into limitations. The EPICOR based IFIMS – Central payment system when proudly rolled out by the Malawi Government at a very prohibitive costs was configured to service the executive branch including three of its constitutional bodies namely, The Malawi Police, The Malawi army and the Accountant general.
So it was obvious to find the truth these four bodies needed to comply and assist with the Baker Tilly auditors if we can even call them that. However the first problem they run into is that all four bodies, Executive branch led by State President Joyce Banda, and the Malawi army led by General Odillo who was dismissed by Malawi’s new President His Excellency Professor Arthur Peter Mutharika, The Malawi police led by Lot Dzonzi and the accountant General all failed to assist with the Auditors.
One cannot be faulted to go as far as saying they put road blocks to make sure the truth was never known as to who was responsible for Master Minding Cashgate.
Bullet 5.2 (I) in the report states clearly that The State House, The Malawi Police and Malawi Army refused to provide Complete Bank Statements. Why did Baker Tilly fail to name the individuals who were responsible in these departments for furnishing those statements as hindering a government sanctioned audit? Why were they being coy? They know the individuals who kept these records, At least the people who were paid by our tax dollars to keep the books.
Bullet 5.2 (ii) Production of Un reliable soft Copy Bank statements by the Accountant General with obviously some deleted entries, Why were the individual in the Accountant general office not mentioned in the report and referred for prosecution as hindering an investigation.
Bullet 5.2 (iii) Non-production and poor filing of accounting records in some Ministries, Why are these people not being mentioned by name?, at the very least referred for further investigation.
Bullet 5.2 (IV) Non availability of officials required to assist the auditors in providing relevant information at Ministries and departments visited by the auditors. How hard did Baker Tilly try to force these individuals to comply?. If they refused with to comply with government sanctioned audit why are these individuals not being dragged to court. Why is baker Tilly not naming names? They were hired to conduct a forensic audit goal of which is to find the criminals and those that might assist the criminals from getting away with a crime.
There were too many Security holes in the IFIMS -central Payment system itself. Epicor never trained the users correctly after selling the Application. User level and system level security was never implemented correctly. The software itself was either not designed well or never configured correctly. Anyone who has seen POS system like the one they use at PTC ( Not sure if it still exist in Malawi) knows that If the checkout clerk charges you twice for an item he cannot on his own reverse that transaction, they call a supervisor, the Supervisor then reverses that transaction. This does not mean that the transaction is completely taken out of the database. Auditors can come back to see which supervisor authorised that transaction even two years later.
No accounting system can delete payment checks once entered in the system. The vendor was happy to sell the software but never offered proper training as part of the package they offered to government. In turn senior government officers delegated to lower lever staff. Passwords appear to have been shared. Why are these people including Epicor not being recommended for at least further investigation by Baker Tilly auditors so we can know who was responsible for this Negligence?.
Who audits the auditors?
