The role of the Accounting Chamber of Ukraine should be more important.
Deputy Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Remi Duflot іn the interview for the MIRROR OF THE WEEK (https://zn.ua/) talked about the necessary for the Accounting Chamber of Ukraine to increase its influence on state policy:
- Implement the best international practices. At the same time, international standards should be allowed to operate without restrictions.
- Change regulations to bring them in line with international standards.
- Perform not only the financial audits or compliance audits that they are doing or trying to do today. But also evolving towards taking a broader view of the reliability, effectiveness, and efficiency of policies, with the objective, of course, of playing a role in improving policies over time.
Remi Duflot noted that the law on the Accounting Chamber, adopted in 2015, allows the use of international standards, INTOSAI, EUROSAI, and others, which are the relevant standards for such institutions as the ACU. But at the same time, the law opens or even paves the way towards a lot of exceptions and backward steps by requiring these standards to be aligned with the Ukrainian constitution or legal framework. Therefore, it’s putting the ACU in an untenable position, where it has to respect international standards, but at the same time, the result of its work, when it is done in line with those international standards, can be challenged in court, as it often happens.
Ukraine is the only country where the Accounting Chamber’s conclusions can be challenged in an administrative court.
“I want to stress that our project EU4ACU, which we launched three years ago, has successfully worked with the current board members to put in place procedures that would allow international standards to be fully implemented in financial, compliance and performance audits. But again, for this to work, the legal framework has to be adapted. We are now in a situation where practice could be so much better, that it puts pressure on the legislator to change the law to align it with international standards. I think this is the right way to go.” said Deputy Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Remi Duflot.
EU4ACU “Strengthening the capacity of external audit in accordance with international standards in Ukraine” is a part of the program “Development of external audit and control of public finances in Ukraine” (EU Public Finance Management Support Programme for Ukraine).
The project is financed by the European Union and implemented by DAI, aiming to ensure more efficient oversight of public resources through enhanced capacities in external audit of budgetary funds by the Accounting Chamber of Ukraine (ACU).
Please read the full interview under the following link: