The Director-General of the Internal Audit Agency, Dr. E.O Osae on Monday 2nd October, 2023 inaugurated the Audit Committee of the Minerals Development Fund.
Dr. Norris Hammah, the Administrator of the Fund in his opening address welcomed all to the office of the Fund. He spoke on the purpose of the meeting and acknowledged the benefit of the committee to the Fund.
Members of the Committee are Mr. Augustine Addo (Chairman and ICAG Rep.), Prof. Kwame Adom Frimpong and Mr. Thomas Thompson-Aryee. Prof. Patrick Agbensinyale and Maame Ama Edumadze -Acquah are representatives of the MDF. Â Madam Abigail Nanor is the secretary to the committee.
Dr. Osae in his opening address, thanked the members of the Committee for their acceptance to serve on the committee. He said by way of corporate governance the system is incomplete without a functioning Audit Committee as it is a statutory requirement under the Public Financial Management Act. He noted that due to the establishment of the fund under the Minerals Development Act 2016, (Act 912) the Fund cannot operate without a functioning Audit Committee.
Dr. Osae enumerated the three main roles of the Audit Committee as Mandatory, Advisory and supporting. The Mandatory role he said requires the Audit Committee to work with the Management of the MDF to implement recommendations from Internal Auditors Reports, External Auditors Reports and any directive from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament as well as reports on monitoring or follow up activities commissioned by the Management of the Fund.
The Committee is also required to produce an Annual Report, which indicates all reports that came to the attention of the Committee, the extent to which Management has been supported to implements recommendations therein, outstanding recommendations not implemented as well as challenges encountered within the period. This report, Dr. Osae informed members are copied to the Office of the President, Parliament, Auditor-General and the Director-General of the Internal Audit Agency. He mentioned the sanctions regime to be applied under the PFM Act on failure to meet requirement.
On the second role of the Committee, he said the Committee is to advise Management and prevent them from falling into avoidable pitfalls. He encouraged Management to invite members of the Audit Committee to be part of Entrance and Exit meetings of External Auditors to help respond to audit issues raised. The Director-General tasked members of the Audit Committee to help them implement a risk management policy if there was none as per the nature of the intuition’s mandate of managing funds, a lot of risk is anticipated. He advised that they support them mainstream Enterprise Risk Management processes to mitigate the funds risk exposure.
Dr. Osae shared on ongoing interventions in the Internal Auditing space and tasked Management to organise an orientation for the members to enable them understand their business processes and challenges to be able bring their expertise on board to help solve them. He pledged his support and that of the Agency to better manage the Institution.
Mr. Hammah in his closing remarks, commended the support of the outgone Committee, the expertise they brought to bear and pledged the support of the Board and Management of the Minerals Development fund to work hand in hand with the new Committee for the good of Mother Ghana.
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