TI Fiji requests the interim administration to allow independent state organizations to function without interference

“Transparency International Fiji requests the interim administration to allow the independent state organizations created under the Constitution to function without interference. This is in reference to the article on page three of today’s (15/01/07) Fiji Times headlined “Auditor General under fire.”

Transparency International asserts that Office of the Auditor General is a fulcrum of the country’s integrity system. Any dilution or undue influence of this office would result in rendering this office powerless to hold state organizations and officials to account.

To be effective the Auditor General should be immune from pressures from the clients or institutions being audited, but his role and functions may be subject to peer review.

TI believes that the Office of the Auditor General should be given more resources and should be strengthened to ensure that this office has all the capacity to take state organizations and officials to accounts.

The OAG should not be pushed into selective auditing. It should have its own programme and his work should be subject to strong scrutiny, in the absence of the Public Accounts Committee, by a powerful independent body to be set up with powers to question the state organizations and officials on use of state assets and make appropriate recommendations for further investigations by relevant authorities”.