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| Audits at Major Public Entities by External Auditor |
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External auditors, from Ernst and Young Paris, are currently in Seychelles and they will soon start to review the country’s seven major public entities - Seypec, Air Seychelles, STC, SCAA, PUC, IDC, and Nouvobanq. The main purpose of the audits is to assess the financial performance and integrity of the financial reporting of the seven entities and identify potential risk exposure to government as the majority shareholder in each of them.
The findings of Ernst and Young Paris will be presented to the Ministry of Finance and they will also put in place an action plan to ensure improvements in the public entity in future. The final report is due September 1. In total the Ernst and Young team comprises of 13 staff members with team members spending about three months in Seychelles. A partner and senior manager from France will be in charge of the overall financial audit process. All three teams will include a manager, consultant, IT expert and junior consultant with the first team examining Air Seychelles, SCAA and IDC. The second team will examine Seypec, PUC, and STC and the third team which will exclusively look at Nouvobanq will have a consultant specialized in the finance sector. The audits are being conducted as part of an IMF and World Bank recommendation in 2008 where they determined that there are risks to government due to the current lack of accountability, monitoring and control of this sector.
Ernst and Young have been selected as the successful bidder in a closed tender process finalized in early May and have provided references demonstrating their experience in auditing in other countries including state owned banks, aviation, manufacturing, state owned petroleum companies, farming and utilities. Their auditors have been selected based on their industry experience. |
