The antagonists including Syed Habib Makki, Jamal Mohammed Fakhroo, Abdulrahman Abdulhussain Jawahery, Abdulrahman Mohammed Jamsheer, argued against the need for an external auditor. Their claim was that the Audit Court itself was more than enough and the presence of an internal auditor would buttress it all.
However, the protagonists argued that the lower House, Chamber of Deputies, had approved the appointment of an external auditor. Fulad said that the quashing of the approval would amount to downplaying the powers of the Chamber and undermining the whole process of democracy.
In addition, it was argued that the Audit Court itself would not be able to handle the entire load – pension benefits now expected to be the same for all irrespective of whether it be from the government or private sectors.
“The Audit Court itself outsources the jobs to external sources,” said Fulad. The organisation itself only had a budget of BD2.5 million in 2007 and BD2.7 million in 2008. How can they audit the accounts of a fund that is worth BD3 million (BD1.5 million from the Pension Fund and another BD1.5 million from Gosi). The staff strength is not enough, they said..
“It is important to have a much more power external audit firm, more in the realm of the auditing giants, to handle such an account,” added Fulad.
Al Matrook said that most issues on this list for not having an external auditor was not there on the agenda of the meeting for the subject. They were brought in at the meeting.
Those who opposed stuck to their stand that in the event of a discrepancy in the audited figures, it would be easy to pinpoint the problem to a particular company, instead of having to wait for an investigation and then rigmarole in putting the finger to the error.
Officials of the Audit Court also aired their views on the subject. Just how thorny the issue was was evident in the manner in which the voting for approval was conducted.
