Public Hearings for 22 Federal Budget Beneficiaries

After the Parliament of FBiH’s Parliamentary Committee responsible for audits, during its 44^th session, scheduled public hearings of audited budget beneficiaries, members of the Parliamentary Committee responsible for the audits of budget beneficiaries of this entity held a session in the Parliament of FBiH. The public hearings were attended by 22 federal budget beneficiaries, having been audited by the Audit Office of the Institutions of BiH. The Audit Office presented 22 performed financial audits, 21 of which were audit reports with qualified opinion and one negative opinion.

The public hearings were attended by MPs from both Houses of the Parliament, who are members of the Parliamentary Committee responsible for audits. Present were also representatives of the audited budget beneficiaries and members of the media. The hearing was also attended by the team of the Project Strengthening Governing Institutions and Processes in BiH, whose goal is to strengthen public accountability and transparency in cooperation with the Parliament of the Federation of BiH.

The topic of the discussion were audit reports of the following budget beneficiaries:

1. Office of the President and two Vice-presidents of the Federation of,
2. Federal Ministry of Interior,
3. Federal Law Enforcement Agency,
4. Government of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina,
5. Federal Ministry of Finance,
6. Federal Ministry of Health,
7. Federal Ministry of Energy, Mining and Industry,
8. Federal Ministry of Trade,
9. Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Policy,
10. Federal Civil Protection Agency,
11. Parliament of the Federation of BiH,
12. Federal Ministry for Issues of Veterans and Disabled Veteran of the Defensive-Liberation War,
13. Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Water-Management and Forestry,
14. Federal Ministry of Culture and Sports,
15. Federal Institute for Statistics,
16. Federal Department of Goods Reserves,
17. Federal Ministry of Justice,
18. Federal Ministry of Transport and Communications,
19. Federal Ministry of Physical Planning,
20. Federal Ministry of Environment and Tourism,
21. Tax Administration of the Federation of BiH,
22. General Services Office of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Water-Management and Forestry received a negative opinion.

We were particularly interested in the hearing for the Federal Ministry of Culture and Sports, which is competent for youth issues in FBiH, pursuant to the Youth Law. The audit report with a qualified opinion for 2013 is available here.

The Audit Office emphasised that qualifications in several latest audit reports have been repeated. The Ministry accepted most of the qualifications and showed willingness to work on eliminating the oversights noted by the Audit Office. The Ministry responded to the qualifications by informing all who attended the session that they have introduced a funds distribution system for current transfers in accordance with the general and special criteria for awarding funds, and that no beneficiaries received new funds without having justified previous expenditures pertaining to funds awarded from current transfers prior to 2013. g. They also believe that it is necessary to impose legal limitations on the amount in the intervention fund, in order to avoid the qualifications relating to funds intended for interventions, which is repeated in the audit reports for this Ministry. The audit reports of budget beneficiaries are available to the public on the website of the Audit Office for the Institutions of FBiH.