By Chioma Obinagwam
Concerned about the alarming corruption rate in the country and a penchant to stem the tide, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) has said it is collaborating with the Federal Government(FG) of Nigeria through a fraud seminar to tackle the menace in the country.
The Acting Country Director of ACCA, Olatunji Adeleye disclosed this during the organisation’s event tagged ‘Connecting Futures,’ held in Lagos recently.
Adeleye noted that the fraud seminar, slated for June 2017, would bring the organisation to the fore in influencing finance professionals in the public sector to discharge their duties with high ethical standards.
He said, “We will also start to look at the government. One of the things we pride ourselves in is in June, we are partnering with the Federal Government on how to fight corruption by organising a fraud seminar and that is one of the things that would put us in the limelight. We want to build finance professionals that will meet our needs. We don’t just want to build finance professionals out there that are just punching numbers. We want to build professionals that would turn around this economy and who the economy will turn to for help.”
“Right about now, you know there are a lot of confusion around the economy.What we Wil be able to do is to try to influence policies and try to influence government as well as influence our members to do the right thing in their organisations and of course the nation at large.” he continued.
Having been identified as the biggest problem facing the country, Nigeria has been estimated to have lost over $400 billion to corruption since independence to 2012 and ranks 136 least corrupt nation out of 175 countries, according to the 2016 Corruption Perceptions Index reported by Transparency International.
However, although common knowledge has it that most fraud cases are perpetrated with the connivance of Finance Professionals, he stressed that qualified ACCA members do not engage in such nefarious acts because of its high standards and screening process.
Adeleye also noted that before one can become an ACCA member, he would have to undergo the 3Es, which represent Exam, Experience and Ethics as well as a testimony by the intending member of strict adherence to the high ethical standards.
“If you look at the ACCA qualification, for you to become an ACCA member, you have to go through what we call the 3Es- Exam, Experience and Ethics. One of the things we pride ourselves in is that we have very high ethical standards. Before you can qualify or become our member, you must have gone through the ethical module, that sort of testify to the fact that you will comply with the high ethical standards. So, one of the things you’ll see is that an ACCA accountant, the ACCA partner, will not perpetrate any unethical behaviour. ” the country director emphasized.
Furthermore, Adeleye noted that the organisation has reiterated its commitment to support it’s customers in addition to remodeling its curriculum to meet current and future needs.
ACCA is a leading international accountancy body, recognised and treated in other countries as being equivalent to their local qualification.