President Muhammadu Buhari has approved the posting of treasury officers from the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) to key revenue agencies.
The Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF), Alhaji Idris Ahmed confirmed this development during a meeting with the leadership of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN).
The President Buhari-led administration also approved that the tenure of the heads of these agencies will be performance-based in line with revenue targets set out for them.
According to Ahmed, the treasury officers from the OAGF are to serve as directors of revenue and investment departments in the revenue generating agencies.
The agencies where the treasury officers will be posted include: the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigerian Customs Service (NCS), Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) among others.
Ahmed stated that the posting was borne out of the need to block revenue leakages in the revenue generating agencies.
He said,
“As part of our roles as drivers of the reforms in the public finance sector and in line with the present government’s commitment to diversify sources of income, strengthen controls as well as boost revenue generation of government, the Treasury has come up with a restructuring of its functions and departments.
“This will ensure that Treasury officers are assigned to key revenue generating agencies, such as NPA, NIMASA, CBN, NNPC, NCS, NCC, and FIRS.
“Government is not unmindful of the level of revenue leakages in some of these key revenue generating agencies and has come up with this policy that will ensure that treasury officers take charge of these revenues so that they can be tracked and accounted for using ICT tools and automation platforms.”
He, therefore, called on ICAN and other professional accounting bodies in the country to support the government’s efforts by coming up with strategies for the government to generate more revenues.
The AGF also urged ICAN to come up with measures to assist the government in reducing the level of corruption in both public and private sectors of the economy.