Claim: The State House said that D669 millions queried by the National Audit Office in their 2017 report was spent in 2016 under the leadership of ex-president Yahya Jammeh

Source: State House Facebook page 

Verdict: False

On April 21, the National Audit Office (NAO) launched the first phase of their audit exercise on Covid-19 expenditure. The audits probe the food aid government gave to vulnerable communities and the purchase of medical equipment during the pandemic. 

The NOA took to the launch a summary of their audit of government accounts for 2017. A part of this summary indicated suspicious withdrawals of government funds amounting to D669 million. These transactions were outside of the formal government financial system handled at the level of the Accountant General’s Department. 

In reaction to the audit findings, the former finance minister Amadou Sanneh urged the parliament to launch an inquiry. 

The claim

On April 26, the Office of the President issued a brief statement saying the withdrawals queried by the auditors were done under the leadership of ex-president Yahya Jammeh and not Adama Barrow.  

“The Ex-Finance Minister, Honourable Amadou Sanneh, is aware that the D669 million mentioned in the Audit Report of 2017 was an expenditure in 2016 when the Barrow government was not in office,” stated a part of the statement. 

Factcheck

By law, in March of any year, the National Audit Office should have audited the government accounts of a preceding year. However, due to capacity constraints the NOA, could not do this. As a result, audits of government books lag by a year or two. 

For example, only the following reports are ready and published: 2016, 2017 and 2018. The 2019 report is ready but not printed, according to NAO. What is certain is that the 2017 report audits the government accounts and financial statements for that year. 

Based on the full 2017 audit report and its summarized version, expenditures quoted were ones done from January 2017 to December 2017. The introduction of the summarized audit report  is clear. “In December 2019, we completed and submitted the audited 2017 financial statement of the Government of The Gambia”. 

According to the audit, an illegal account was opened in 2012 without the knowledge of the Accountant General’s Department. This account received a deposit of D633,229,723. At least D631,717,859 was withdrawn from this account as at its closure in 2017. The auditors said another account was opened from February to October 2017 with a total deposit of 41,687,902. The auditors said D35,844,485 was withdrawn from this account before its closure. It was clear from the audit that the Barrow administration found the accounts illegally opened by Jammeh and created their own later where over D35 million was spent.

So the auditors had made it clear in the report that the withdrawals were made from an account inherited from the Jammeh administration and ordered closed on their recommendations. Instead, the OP under Barrow reopened them “with the same account name but a different account number”.

In conclusion, the NAO had already published their report which probed the government accounts for 2016 as it can be accessed on their website. 

Verdict: the OP’s claim is false