Retrospective of activities, carried out by the Court of Accounts in the first 7 months of 2021

The Court of Accounts of the Republic of Moldova (CoARM) continues to carry out its audit activity according to the approved program. On August 2, took place the last meeting of the Court of Accounts meant to examine the results of the audit missions carried out, the meetings of the CoARM being resumed in September.

According to the statistical balance of the external public audit activity, in the first 7 months of 2021, the Court of Accounts performed 37 audit missions out of the total planned 76, initiated and carries out 14 audit missions, and the remaining 25 are to be initiated until the end of this year.

The members of the CoARM convened in 33 plenary sessions, as a result of which 40 audit reports were examined and approved, all of which were made public and submitted to the Parliament, the Government and other interested parties. Until the dissolution of the Parliament, between January and May 2021, the Parliamentary Public Finances Control Committee examined 16 audit reports (40% of the total reports approved by the CoARM).

At the same time, in the same period has been organized:

Certification of public auditors

The CoARM continues the certification of public auditors according to the requirements of art. 27 of the Law no.260/2017. During the certification process of the current year, 25 employees of the CoARM with external public audit attributions were professionally trained on 3 of the 4 compulsory modules in fields such as: IT, legal and ISSAI International Auditing Standards. In September, the audit team will be trained in accounting and financial reporting. The evaluation test of the certification process will take place between September and October 2021.

Peer-review international evaluation

From 2020, the CoARM is the subject of an international evaluation, carried out by the European Union and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), at the initiative of SIGMA, the Latvian Audit Office and the Turkish Court of Accounts. This exercise was requested by our institution and is being carried out in the Republic of Moldova for the first time according to the methodology developed by SIGMA, based on the INTOSAI Professional Declarations Framework, SIGMA Document no. 54, SAI performance management framework developed by IDI INTOSAI etc.

The purpose of the evaluation is to give an independent and objective assessment if the Supreme Audit Institution of the Republic of Moldova – the Court of Accounts, and its activity are organized according to the requirements and criteria of the INTOSAI Professional Statements, necessary for effective performance and achievement institutional performance. At the moment, the group of international experts has completed the program of evaluation activities and presented to the Court of Accounts the first version of the report for analysis and necessary comments, so that in autumn 2021 the final report will be closed, made public and presented to all stakeholders. The results of this international evaluation, in particular the recommendations of the experts, will serve as a basis for streamlining the activity and increasing the institutional performance according to the best practices in the field of external public audit.

PEFA evaluation

The PEFA (Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability) exercise is a tool for assessing the status of public finance management and covers the period during 2018-2020. The evaluators of the World Bank (WB), in the context of the PEFA evaluation mission, launched at the country level on July 13, organized a series of workshops, discussions and interviews with institutions responsible for public spending, including the Court of Accounts. Thus, the Members of the Court of Accounts and the team of managers participated in several discussions and offered explanations and clarifications during the evaluation of the indicators related to the external public audit activity and collaboration with the Parliament: IP 30 ,, External audit ”and IP 31 ,,The examination by the legislature of the audit reports ”, as well as of the multiple indicators IP 1 - IP 29 related to the evaluation of the planning, execution and reporting of public expenditures, as well as the internal managerial control, and the internal audit.

World Bank’s appreciation

The Court of Accounts audited projects financed by the World Bank. In this context, the Bank highly appreciated the quality of the Court of Accounts' audits, confirming the confidence in the quality and credibility of the CoARM's work.

International activities

During the reference period, the Court of Accounts actively participated in various international events, seminars, workshops, organized by teleconference within the relevant international organizations: INTOSAI Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals, INTOSAI Working Group on Public Debt, EUROSAI Working Group on Environmental Auditing, EUROSAI Project Group on Auditing the Response to COVID-19, Working Group on Audit Standards within the Council of the Heads of the Supreme Audit Institutions of the Member States of the Community of Independent States (CIS).

Also, in the spring of this year, the sessions of the supreme forums of two international organizations took place, the Court of Accounts being member of them: the XIX Congress of EUROSAI and the XIX Session of the Council of the Heads of the Supreme Audit Institutions of the CIS.

The activity of the Court of Accounts in the last year of its membership in the Governing Board of EUROSAI was marked by the efficiency and launch of a series of initiatives and proposals, accepted and included in the future business plans of the governing body of the European Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions.

Assessing the patrimony abroad

For the first time, the CoARM aimed to assess and obtain an overview of the situation in the field of patrimony management outside the borders of the Republic of Moldova. In this regard, in the context of mandatory financial audits carried out annually within 9 ministries, non-compliances were identified regarding the management and administration of public property objects located abroad. At the same time, a delegation of the CoARM undertook a working visit to the Odessa region, Ukraine, during which topics focused on the integrity of the national patrimony in the region and the directions of cooperation of the two supreme audit institutions were addressed.

Synthesis of audit results

The CoARM is also concerned about the lack of transparency in the privatization process, compliance in public procurement, but also the inefficiency of public assets management. We aim to identify gaps, deviations and irregularities in these areas and as a result issue recommendations to improve the areas audited.

At present, the CoARM summarizes the audit results on the following important areas such as: public procurement, privatizations and assets abroad, to be included in the 2020 Annual Report. At the same time, the 2020 Annual Report will include a separate chapter, which will be dedicated to the management of public finances used to combat and prevent COVID-19 infection, taking into account the timeliness and importance of this topic.

In this context, for the analytical generalization of the audit results in the above mentioned fields, during the current August, the Court of Accounts decided to systematize the results of the completed audit missions and to elaborate the following documents:

• The annual report on the administration and use of public financial resources and public assets in 2020, which will include the conclusions of all audit missions carried out since the approval of the previous annual report (presented annually to Parliament by 15 September);
• Analytical summary report of audit results on the management of public finances to combat and prevent COVID-19 infection
• Analytical synthesis report of audit results in the field of public procurement;
• Analytical synthesis report of audit results in the field of privatization;
• Analytical synthesis report of audit results in the field of heritage management outside the borders of the Republic of Moldova.

Finally, the Court of Accounts will inform the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova and other interested parties about the results summarized in the mentioned reports.

Privatization of public property during 2013-2019, a topic discussed during the meeting of the Court of Accounts

The sustainability of the state social insurance budget is influenced by the insufficiency of income, also determined by the phenomenon of „envelope wages”