A corporate lawyer, Mr. Gbenga Ajisafe, has lamented that the Internal Auditing profession had been neglected in Nigeria both at the tertiary institutions and professional levels, including those in practice.

He stressed that internal auditing remained the panacea to corruption and inefficiencies in government agencies.

Quote:“Internal auditing is about immortalising good corporate governance, effective enterprise-wide risk management and internal controls, compliance and good reporting system in any organisation,” Ajisafe said.

Incorporating internal auditing in government agencies as done in developed countries would bring about innovations that would be acceptable as global best practices and assist in developing the local industries’’.

Ajisafe noted that the role of internal audit is to stamp out corruption, which, according to him, is one of the challenges Nigeria is facing in developing its industries and growing the economy.

Ajisafe, however, stressed that internal auditors should leverage technology to predict trends and intercept issues before they snowball into more serious problems.

Other tax and corporate lawyers at a conference, have also said that the introduction and adoption of simple process of auditing guidelines, Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), monitoring for compliance and punishment for defaulter will drastically reduce corruption in the country and boost SMEs’ capacity.
Mr. Samson Agbalaya, who is also a corporate lawyer, said corruption is an unbridled propensity to amass wealth over and above the human need with attendant effect on the nation and its economy.
“Corruption distorts the market, increases terrorism and universal hate, results in lack of employment and kills the small scale industries,” the tax lawyer said, adding that internal audit helps to strengthen the control mechanism in organisations, corporate entities and the country at large.
According to him, internal auditing remains a viable tool for efficient and effective risk management, internal control or compliance and governance processes, adding that it was designed to add value to organisations and help them accomplish their objectives.
“Robotic process automation saves time and allows the auditor to face other salient activities. There can also be block chain network of ledgers and data to eliminate intermediaries and boost efficiency.
“It is not at the end of a fiscal year that the government needs to invite an external audit. By then, the crime had been committed and the damage control put in place by the government might not be as effective to assist our industries,” he said.

https://www.financialdigest.com.ng/blog/2019/02/08/internal-auditing-is-the-panacea-to-corruption-in-government-agencies-gbenga-ajisafe/