Auditor General to scrutinise GPO over $500M indebtedness to Govt

Following a process of reconciliation the Ministry of Social Protection has submitted financial information to the Auditor General’s Office of Guyana regarding a possible $567M owed to the Ministry by the Guyana Post Office Corporation (GPOC). This money is in relation to the Imprest Bank Account.

According to the Auditor General’s Report for the fiscal year 2015, the cash book summary showed that the sum of $594.778M was owed by GPOC to the Ministry. Included in that amount was the sum of $990,000 which had to do with fraudulent coupons. Further, the report indicated that an examination of the reconciliation statement from GPOC for December 2015 revealed that the Ministry was indebted to the Corporation in the sum of $187.201M.

The report also revealed that the reconciliation statement of the Imprest Bank Account reflected an unreconciled difference of $156.246M as of December 31, 2015. This issue was a subject of discussion at the recently held Public Accounts Committee meeting. Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Ms Lorene Baird, was asked to given an update on the difference of figures. She said that when the AG’s statement was prepared, the GPOC’s total was used as the residual and in 2014 the Auditor General had asked the Ministry to state specifically what the post office’s figure is. The AG had recommended that the Head of Budget Agency in the Ministry should take urgent action to reconcile the GPOC’s indebtedness to the Ministry and submit the results as well as the reconciliation in respect of the un-reconciled difference for audit scrutiny.

Baird added that when this was done, it was discovered that indeed there was an unreconciled difference.

“So he had advised us to reconcile the post office figures and that we did. We did from 2012 to 2015. Both years have been completed and we have submitted the findings to the auditor general for his scrutiny and for him to direct us further.” She said that up to that point, the figures had changed a bit. According to the PS, the $156.246M had reduced and instead of $594M, the figure is now $567M. Baird said that at present the Ministry is working on 2011 and 2016. However, she noted that the agency will have to visit the accounts of earlier years because the system which exists uses the GPOC as the balancing item.

The Imprest Bank Account was established specifically to deal with Old Age Pension Scheme and the Public Assistance Programme. Based on records at the Ministry, there are currently 50,100 pensioners benefiting from the pension scheme.

(Kaieteur news)