Supporting to Strengthen the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General

 

An independent and a well functioning Supreme Audit Institution is essential for public financial management system to ensure accountability and good governance. The Constitution of Bangladesh established the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (OCAG) as the Supreme Audit Institution. The Government of Bangladesh (GoB) and development partners have reviewed the performance of OCAG and found that there is a substantial continuing need for assistance to improve operations to international standards.

The preparation for the proposed Grant funded project “Strengthening Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General” is ongoing under the broad umbrella of “Strengthening Public Expenditure Management Program (SPEMP)” funded by Multi Donors Trust Fund. The World Bank is administering the trust fund.

The proposed “Strengthening Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General” project’s aims to support OCAG to attain enhanced professional capacity and operational practice to produce and disseminate timely quality audit reports to the public meeting international standards that earn enhanced responsiveness of the executives.

In December, through bilateral discussions and a widely attended brain storming workshop, the project preparations advanced significantly in defining the project components and activities. The preparation team also discussed expected time frame and identified associated key actions that would be critical to rationalize the project concept, expedite the approval process of the Government, World Bank and the development partners and support successful implementation of the project.

To achieve the broad objective, the proposed project is divided into three key components. The first component aims to strengthen independence and effectiveness of the OCAG. This component would support enhancing independence of OCAG through facilitating enactment and implement of a new audit law, improving OCAG’s support to the Public Accounts committee.

The second Component would work to enhance the accountability and efficiency of OCAG through addressing issues relating to enhancing Audit Quality, coverage, timeliness, improve delivery and deciding high level training needs. It also aims introduce external resources through twinning and contracting, initiating automation of audit process and management etc.

The proposed project also aims to enhance the Institutional Capacity of Financial Management Academy (FIMA) which can be utilized as a centre of educational excellence for supplying comprehensive accreditation courses that meet the needs of the OCAG in increasing the skill level of its staffs to international level.

The proposed project will complement the ongoing CIDA funded “Strengthening Comptrollership and Oversight of Public Expenditure “(SCOPE) Project through a common Result Monitoring Framework and shared and integrated project management with well sequenced implementation plan.