LAHORE, March 16: The Auditor-General of Pakistan (AGP) on Saturday lent support to the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) Ordinance, 2001, asserting that (the function of) account-keeping was (a) federal (subject) under the Constitution.

The CGA ordinance was promulgated on July 1 on the “advice” of the multilateral donors to separate the accounting functions from auditing to introduce greater transparency and improve management of public funds by doing away with the conflict of interest which might arise if both functions were vested in one organization or person. The law transferred all accounting functions to the CGA, removing the provincial control over the AGs. The auditing functions have, however, been retained by the AGP under a separate ordinance.

“My personal opinion is that the CGA Ordinance should stay (in its existing shape) as the Constitution’s articles (pertaining to public account-keeping) do not relate to the provinces. I believe that whatever is done (in this respect) must be done according to the law and the Constitution of the country. And I’ve written the same to the NRB,” AGP Manzur Husain stated while responding to a question by this reporter.

The provinces are reportedly trying to get the ordinance which came into effect last July amended to retain operational control ocer the AGs, claiming that the law “nullifies” the concept of devolution of power to the grassroots level and undermines the provincial autonomy.

Senior government officials claim that the NRB and the finance division are also sympathetic to the provincial viewpoint. A high-level meeting held last month had decided that the “law should be changed in such a way that the provinces got back the operational control over the AGs, allowing the CGA to continue to its technical control over them”. It had further decided to “provincialize” the accounting functions through civil service reforms”. Besides, the audit and accounting services be bifurcated into separate audit and accounts services through the same reforms.

“(If the provinces and others who wish to amend the CGA law in order to retain operational control over the provincial accountants general) they should change the Constitution,” the AGP replied to another question.

It may be recalled that the provincial governments have so far not transferred manpower or capital assets to the AGs as required under the CGA law despite the passage of more than eight months of its promulgation. In the Punjab, of 34 DAOs working in as many districts, only six are under the administrative control of the AG.