Reports have revealed that the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation (NTDC) failed to return its unspent balance of N8.6 million at the end of the 2016 fiscal year to the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF).

According to Premium Times, the Auditor-General’s report for 2017 is the latest by the auditor-general and was recently made public.

The infraction is a violation of section 414 of the Financial Regulations (2009) which requires unspent balances to lapse with the financial year.

The audit report on the accounts of the federation for 2017, the most recent by the auditor-general, said the unremitted amount was the balance of three subheads: LT&T Training (N3,295,000); LT&T Others (N2,285,000) and Local Training (N3,025,000) totalling N8,605,000.

According to the report, the Auditor-General of the Federation, Anthony Ayine, directed the
Director-General of the NTDC to remit the unspent sum to the Consolidated Revenue Fund and forward the evidence of remittance to this office for confirmation.

The director-general of NTDC during the period of the infractions was Sally Mbanefo.

The current director-general of the NTDC, Folorunsho Coker who was not the director-general when the infractions occurred, assumed office in April 2017.

However, he was reportedly the director-general when the audit was conducted and when the report was released.

In the same vein, the audit report found irregularities in the expenditure of N8.6 million by the agency as training allowances in 2015.

The auditors found that the application for the training allowance was dated December 22, 2015, and approval given on the same date, whereas the training was purportedly held on October 27 and November 25, 2015, two months before the application.

They found out that payments were not made to individual beneficiaries as only the grade level and the number of staff were indicated in the memo but the names of the staff were not provided.

Also, the certificates of attendance were not produced to authenticate the payments, the report added.

The auditors suspected from the anomalies a possible diversion of the funds.

“The Director-General is required to recover the sum of ₦8,605,000.00 (Eight million, six hundred and five thousand naira) and forward evidence of recovery to my office.

“No response was received from the Director-General even when reminder was written to him, hence he is requested to comply with all the Recommendations stated above,” the Auditor-General wrote in the report.