Khaberni - The specialized parliamentary committees in the House of Representatives hold their meetings on Sunday to discuss a number of issues.
The Finance Committee will discuss the Audit Bureau's report for the year 2024, related to the Ministry of Public Works, Housing, and its affiliated departments.
The House of Representatives, in a legislative session, referred the 73rd annual report of the Audit Bureau for the year 2024, to its Finance Committee.
The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mazen Al-Qadi, received on Tuesday the Audit Bureau's report for the year 2024, during his reception of the president of the bureau, Radi Hamadein, emphasizing the importance of the audit role in preserving public funds, and indicating full support of the council for the independence of the Audit Bureau and its supervisory role.
Al-Qadi added that the directives of His Majesty King Abdullah II on preserving public funds and enhancing integrity and transparency, require all authorities to cooperate, and that establishing the rules of justice and equality is the path towards the rule of law, affirming that the council gives permanent importance to the Audit Bureau's reports.
The Audit Bureau's report for the year 2024 recorded a financial saving of 22.3 million dinars, resulting from the execution of 123,369 audit tasks, and a total of 444,766 work hours carried out by 294 auditors, distributed over 49% for post-audit, 24% for follow-up, 15% for participation in committees, 9% for pre-audit, and 3% for surprise inspections.
The Audit Bureau completed 11,050 technical engineering audit tasks carried out by 38 engineers, as the bureau's 73rd annual report for the fiscal year 2024 comes within a new media policy based on transparency, impact measurement, simplification of information, and increased readability, showcasing the results of audit and supervision of the executive authority's works, aiming to enhance the role integration between authorities and reinforce the system of integrity, transparency, and accountability.
According to the report, the Audit Bureau issued during the past year 115 audit outputs, with a response rate for the audit outputs at 59%, compared to 48% in 2023 and 21% in 2022, showing a gradual improvement reflecting the effectiveness of the new audit approach.
The report indicated an improvement in the response of ministries and departments, as the number of supervisory observations decreased to 512 in 2024 compared to 2156 in 2023, with 270 violations corrected. The independent institutions also recorded a sharp decrease in the number of observations to 82 compared to 558 in 2023, with 58 violations corrected.
Significant improvement was seen in the local administration sector, where 225 observations out of 359 supervisory observations in 2024 were corrected, compared to 970 observations in 2023. The number of observations in the sector of government-owned companies decreased to 69 compared to 1059 in 2023, and 43 violations were corrected.
In terms of performance improvement, the bureau assessed 166 internal audit units within a project that accounted for 10% of the audit effort, with improvement plans set for the year 2025, and also implemented training programs that included 612 employees representing 162 government entities.
The report confirmed the continuation of the Audit Bureau as the sole accredited entity for auditing loans and grants, where it issued 33 audit reports during 2024, in addition to auditing the budgets of 35 political parties.
In the area of violations, the report included 1,078 violations and observations within 115 audit outputs, and 3,279 observations and violations within 1,003 audit memos, resulting in 11 outputs referred to the judiciary, and 8 outputs to the Integrity and Anti-Corruption Commission, with 46 decisions to recover expenses, and 41 decisions for immediate recovery.
On the aspect of citizen interaction, the bureau received 435 complaints during 2024, resulting in 15 audit outputs, i.e., 13% of the total outputs, compared to 486 complaints in 2023 and 289 in 2022, indicating an enhancement of citizens' trust in the bureau's supervisory role.
Hamadein explained that the 2024 report was issued in a new format divided into four main parts, focusing on performance supervision, impact measurement, and enhancing the concept of value for money, emphasizing that the upcoming phase will witness a greater focus on following up on audit outputs and accelerating correction, contributing to improving public performance and proper management of resources and safeguarding public funds.
