The country’s Auditor General, Junias Kandjeke, has issued a qualified audit opinion on the financial affairs of the Office of the President.

Kandjeke issued this report from the audit of the financial year ended 31 March 2021, and the report was compiled in March 2022.

The report states that the Office of the President deserves a qualified audit opinion due to six illegal credit cards and bank accounts which were opened with a local commercial bank long before 2019 without treasury approval.

According to the report, the six credit cards were allocated to different officials working closely with the president.

“This same issue was raised in the audit reports of 2019/2020 and nothing was done to correct it, since the six bank credit cards were in use without treasury’s approval,” reads the statement.

The report further states that the auditor general’s office had audited these six credit cards and discovered several anomalies in connection with their use.

One of the bank cards incurred deficit of N.dollars 5 672.32 and no invoices were provided to the auditors to substantiate the losses.

“Worse, the auditor also found out that this particular card’s account was even closed at the bank and that the employment contract of the official who used the card already expired in December 2020,” reads the statement.

The statement indicates that an explanation was given to the auditors, saying the money (N.dollars 5 672.32) was deducted from the leave days of the staff member who used the card when his contract came to an end in December 2020.

The auditors also heard that two of the six bank credit cards were closed on 31 March 2021, meaning for now three of those six credit cards are still in use.

“However, the auditor general’s office was not provided with any proof to support these explanations,” stated Kandjeke.

A qualified audit opinion refers to a financial report which was fairly presented to the auditors with the exception of a specified area.

Source: The Namibian press Agency