Housing PS yet to answer for E150m

MANZINI – The Principal Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development is yet to answer for E150 million.

The money, according to the Auditor General (AG), Timothy Matsebula, was transferred to the Eswatini National Housing Board (ENHB). The AG, in his Consolidated Government Financial Statements (annual accounts) of the Kingdom of Eswatini for the financial year ended March 31, 2022, said the controlling officer did not respond on the audit query.

He said: “I reported that there were unaccounted-for funds transferred to the National Housing Board from the ministry amounting E150 million in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2022.”

He said the audited financial statements of the ENHB for the financial year ended March 31, 2022 depicted a subvention received from government (Ministry of Housing and Urban Development) of E7.5 million and E9.2 million in the previous fiscal year.

Matsebula reported to have advised the controlling officer to explain the purpose of the money transferred to the entity and that the public funds should be accounted for accordingly. Also, he reported to have requested the PS to provide all supporting documents for these transferred funds to the ENHB.

On the other hand, Matsebula reported that an audit query raised in the previous year on unrecovered public funds amounting to E27 782 882.73 in respect of Human Settlement Development, under the Principal Secretary’s Office, was not addressed by the ministry.

Manual

He said Section 11, paragraph 1.8 of the Financial Management and Accounting Procedures Manual (1993) stipulates that; ‘Suspense Accounts are the temporary locations for any transactions where the correct centre and item or amount are not immediately apparent. After this information becomes known, the entry would be transferred out of the suspense account and allocated to the correct item. Section 11, paragraph 2.20 further states that; ‘greatest attention needs to be paid to the reconciliation of below-the-line accounts as part of the year-end procedures since any remaining balances will show in the Treasury Report as an asset or liability and will be carried forward to the next financial year’.

The AG reported that statements detailing all balances should be forwarded to Treasury to support the entries in the statement of assets and liabilities and to enable the auditor general to verify such balances.

Matsebula said the controlling officer in his response stated that on the May 27, 2021, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) recommended that the ENHB should pay back the money.

Balance

However, he said at the time of compiling this report, the balance remained un-cleared. Furthermore, the AG reported that the controlling officer did not provide him with an update on the status of his ministry’s implementation of the PAC’s resolution.

Matsebula said the PS in response said the ministry informed its parastatal of the PAC’s decision. He submitted that the PS had informed him that the ENHB submitted a request to SCOPE for a write-off of the due amount.

“Enquiries were previously made with the Director of Public Enterprise, who advised that such request should be sanctioned by the Ministry of Finance before submission to SCOPE. A request to write-off the debt has been written to the Ministry of Finance and awaiting response,” reads in part the report.