By NATION REPORTER
GOVERNMENT has grossly violated the Constitution by hiring two private auditing firms, Grant Thornton and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) to undertake the audits of Zambia’s Defence and Security Wings, Given Lubinda has charged.
And Mr Lubinda says the confession by Vice-President Mutale Nalumango that she was uninformed about government’s decision to contract Grant Thornton and Price Water Coopers House to intrude into the books of the country’s Defence and Security Wings was confirmation that the Vice-President is not part of the governance system of the new dawn administration.
Mr Lubinda, the Patriotic Front (PF) acting president has said the Executive through the Ministry of Finance has breached Section 73 subsection (1) and subsection (3) of the Public Finance Act of 2018, which clearly spells out the functions of the Office of the Auditor General.
He said in a statement yesterday that only the Office of the Attorney General under section 5(3), subsection (2) had the statutory mandate to hire private auditing firm to carry out audits on selected and non-sensitive organs of government.
Mr Lubinda said it was against the rule of law for the Ministry of Finance to have subjected the Office of the Auditor General to coercion and control in its discharge of its constitutional mandate as provided for in the statutes.
“Whoever signed the Grant Thornton and Price Water Coopers House contract at the Ministry of Finance breached the provisions of the Public Finance Management Act,” Mr Lubinda said.
Mr Lubinda stated that, that government had gone ahead to hire the two private firms could mean that either the Attorney General was failing to provide legal advice to government or that his advice was being disregarded in which case, the governance of the country was under threat.
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