At
least 20 personnel from the National Audit office recently benefited from a
five-day intensive training course on public procurement rules and regulations,
as well as the principal Act.
The
training session was organised by GPPA in partnership with the EU long-term
consultant, in a bid to build the capacity of auditors to better help them to
do their work effectively and in an efficient manner.
Speaking
at the training course, John Auma of the EU long-term consultant’s office, said
they have been doing the reform programme for the last two to three months.
He
said they are providing public procurement audit skills to the officials of the
National Audit Office, focused on how to support the government in governance
structures by conducting proper public procurement audits.
Mr
Auma said the aim of the training course was to give the senior managers of the
national audit office the skills on public procurement auditing.
He
said public procurement audit is not naturally different from financial audit,
adding that public procurement audit being a new auditing process; auditors
need to be equipped with the necessary skills on how to conduct public
procurement audits.
He
added that 20 participants are in this intensive training course, and that at
the end of their training, they expect participants to have proper skills on
how to go out to government ministries and departments to conduct proper public
procurement auditing.
Ebrima
Drammeh, a participant from the National Audit Office, described the training
as important in the sense that it is part of public financial management in The
Gambia.
He
said as part of the training course, they were exposed to new skills that could
help them to enhance their capacity on public procurement, and also to guide
them on the Act.
He thanked GPPA and the EU long-term
consultant for organising this kind of training activity, while challenging
them to be frequently organising such for government officials who are involved
in the public procurement system.
He
also assured the organizers that the knowledge gained during the training
course would be fully utilized, and put into good use.
Bintou
Gassama, another participant from the National Audit Office, also expressed
similar sentiments and thanked the GPPA for the training course which, she
said, was geared toward helping them to be more responsive and effective to
their daily work on enforcing the public procurement rules and regulations.
She also challenged the participants to
disseminate the information, and to apply the knowledge to the letter.