{"id":107275,"date":"2020-10-04T16:54:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-04T23:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=107275"},"modified":"2020-10-04T16:54:00","modified_gmt":"2020-10-04T23:54:00","slug":"the-allegation-that-the-20th-amendment-seeks-to-reduce-the-powers-of-the-auditor-general","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/10\/04\/the-allegation-that-the-20th-amendment-seeks-to-reduce-the-powers-of-the-auditor-general\/","title":{"rendered":"The allegation that the 20th Amendment seeks to reduce the powers of the Auditor General"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/strong> Prime Minister<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The opposition has been trying to propagate the idea\nthat the Auditor General\u2019s powers would be reduced by the proposed 20th  Amendment. It\u2019s seldom that the Constitutional\nprovisions regarding the Auditor General comes to the attention of the public.\nThis has made it easier for the opposition to propagate various falsehoods in\nthis connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the false claims being made is that the 19th\nAmendment set up an Audit Commission and that the 20th Amendment seeks to\nabolish it. What the 19th Amendment made provision for was not an Audit\nCommission but only an Audit Service Commission. The Audit Service Commission\ndoes not carry out any auditing functions. It handles matters like the\nappointment, promotion, transfer and disciplinary control of members of the\nState Audit Service. Usually such matters pertaining to government servants are\ndealt with by the Public Service Commission. All that the creation of the Audit\nService Commission achieved was to set up yet another Commission to do the work\nthat was being done by the Public Service Commission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another false claim being made by the opposition is\nthat the 20th Amendment seeks to remove the Presidential Secretariat and the\nOffice of the Prime Minister from the purview of the Auditor General. From the\nvery inception of the 1978 Constitution, the Presidential Secretariat and the Prime\nMinister\u2019s Office have been under the purview of the Auditor General. The\nphrase all departments of government\u201d in Article 154(1) of the pre-19th\nAmendment Constitution brought the Presidential Secretariat and the Prime\nMinister\u2019s Office under the purview of the Auditor General. These institutions\nwere always listed as government departments in the Government Financial\nRegulations. Quite apart from these two institutions, even the Office of Former\nPresidents is listed as a seperate government department and all these\ninstitutions were always audited by the Auditor General. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The inclusion of the Presidential Secretariat and the\nOffice of the Prime Minister by name in Article 154(1), by the 19th Amendment did\nnot achieve anything new. Even though they may have not\nbeen specifically mentioned by name, from the very inception of the 1978\nConstitution, the Presidential Secretariat and Prime Ministers Office had\nalways been under the purview of the Auditor General. Even after the 20th\nAmendment reinstates the old article 154(1) which existed from the inception of\nthe 1978 Constitution, in place of the so called \u2018changes\u2019 made by the 19th\nAmendment, the Presidential Secretariat and the Prime Minister\u2019s Office will\ncontinue to remain within the purview of the Auditor General. Over the past\ndecades, it\u2019s the Auditor General who audited the Presidential Secretariat and\nthe Prime Minister\u2019s Office and not some private audit firm. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another falsehood that\u2019s being propagated is\nthat state owned companies will be removed from the purview of the Auditor\nGeneral by the 20th Amendment. The auditing of state corporations and state\nowned companies (i.e. companies in which the state owns more than 50% of the\nshares) comes under Article 154(2) of the Constitution. Under the provisions of\nArticle 154(2), the minister in charge of the subject can assign the auditing\nof a state corporation or a state owned company to a qualified audit firm.\nHowever before doing so, he is mandatorily required to obtain the concurrence\nof the Finance Minister and also to consult the Auditor General. After the minister\nin charge of the subject assigns the auditing of a state corporation or a state\nowned company to an audit firm in this manner, the Auditor General can issue a\nwritten notice to that audit firm informing them that he proposes to utilize their\nservices for the performance and discharge of the Auditor-General\u2019s duties in\nrelation to that state corporation or state owned company, and thereupon that\naudit firm is mandatorily required to act under the direction and control of\nthe Auditor-General.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The content of Article 154(2) which existed from the\ninception of the 1978 Constitution, was not changed by the 19th Amendment. The\ncontent of Article 154(2) will not change under the 20th Amendment either.\nTherefore it can be said that the content of Article 154(2) has remained the\nsame from the inception of the 1978 Constitution and will continue to remain so\nin the future as well. Hence the claim that state owned companies are to be\ntaken out of the purview of the Auditor General, is a complete falsehood.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is also being claimed by opposition propagandists that\nthe 19th Amendment had stipulated that the Auditor General should be a \u2018qualified\nauditor\u2019 and that when the 20th Amendment reinstates the old pre-19th Amendment\nArticle 153(1) this qualification requirement will be dropped and hence, after\nthe 20th Amendment is passed, even an unqualified person can be appointed as\nAuditor General. Constitutions are written on the assumption that those reading\nit will have basic common sense. The Constitution does not state anywhere that\nthe person appointed as Attorney General or as a Supreme Court judge has to be\na qualified lawyer. But those appointed as Attorney General, Auditor General or\na Supreme Court judge will always have the required educational and\nprofessional qualifications without which they cannot function in those\npositions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All that the 20th Amendment seeks to do is to replace\nthe changes made to the provisions relating to the Auditor General by the 19th\nAmendment with the provisions that existed before the 19th Amendment. The\nopposition has been unhesitatingly uttering every lie that comes to mind with\nregard to this matter because of the confidence that most people would not be\nfamiliar with these obscure provisions of the Constitution. Its our duty to understand\nthe facts of the matter and to defeat the unprincipled attempt being made by\nthe opposition to mislead the people.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/strong> Prime Minister<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mahinda Rajapaksa Prime Minister The opposition has been trying to propagate the idea that the Auditor General\u2019s powers would be reduced by the proposed 20th  Amendment. It\u2019s seldom that the Constitutional provisions regarding the Auditor General comes to the attention of the public. This has made it easier for the opposition to propagate various falsehoods […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125,100,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-107275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mahinda-rajapaksa","category-new-constitution","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107275\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}