Monrovia — At least US$20 million and more cannot be accounted for by the Liberia Petroleum Refinery Company (LPRC) and the Ministry of Information, Cultural Affairs and Tourism (MICAT) under the leaderships of former managing director T. Nelson Williams and former Minister Lewis G. Brown, according to an audit done by the General Auditing Commission (GAC).

In addition to the alleged misappropriation of that whopping amount, the GAC audit on LPRC for the financial years 2010 to 2014 and MICAT for the fiscal years 2012/2013 to 2014/2015 submitted to the legislature, also observed material deficiencies and irregularities in the financial and operational management of the two entities.

The two reports are among several audit reports submitted to the Legislature.

According to the report, Messrs. Williams and Brown served as heads of their respective entities during the audit periods.

The major findings of the LPRC's portion of the audit report among others indicate that Williams' administration carried out transactions amounting to US$19,219,879.13 without adequate documentation such as contracts, evidence of procurement conducted or evidence of liabilities to substantiate payments.

According to the report, the Auditing Commission had requested the LPRC management during the audit periods to account for the amount.

The GAC further observed that there was no evidence that cash receipts amounting to US$437,250 were deposited in LPRC bank account by the Williams management. Again, GAC said it requested Mr. Williams and his team of managers to account for the amount, during the audit periods.

The GAC further said that they found out that several transactions on the entity's US dollars account with the Liberian Bank for Development and Investment (LBDI) "appeared not to be recorded in the cash book for the period under audit and were not adjusted to the bank balance on the bank reconciliation statement for the month in which the bank account was affected. These unrecorded transactions were withdrawals of US$1,077,818.59 and deposits of US$3,650,548.94 on the bank account."

The auditing entity disclosed that they were unable to perform "alternative procedure to determine the recording of these transactions due to the limitation of scope from the non-submission of documents."

Under the Lewis Brown-led MICAT, GAC observed that the management made, what they described as "several third-party payments to the staffs" of MICAT for what his administration claimed were "media intelligence payments" and other media related services amounting to US$1,029,654.87. According to the auditing agency, Mr. Brown, who until few weeks ago was Liberia's Permanent Representatives to the United Nations, didn't give those alleged payments to the providers of the goods and services or their authorized representatives as required by the Public Finance Management Act of 2009.

"The audit noted the MICAT Management made payments amounting to US$2,053,274.87 as basic salary and allowances to its employees without evidence of attendance records to justify the payments. The MICAT Management did not prepare monthly bank reconciliations for three of its bank accounts during the period under audit."

The audit further noted MICAT Management disbursed an amount of L$11,550,161 and US$1,630,314.10 from the Ministry's operational accounts at the Central Bank of Liberia without evidence of supporting documents which GAC holds Management accountable.

The GAC also disclosed that all throughout this fiscal years 2012/2013 to 2014/2015, Ambassador Brown and his team of managers did not prepare monthly bank reconciliations for its bank accounts.

In addition to that, they further found out that MICAT did not prepare annual procurement plan for procurement activities amounting to US$549,252.23 in violation of the Public Procurement Act of 2005 as amended and restated 2010.

GAC, headed by Madam Yusador S. Gaye, is urging Speaker Bhofal Chambers and his colleagues in the House of Representatives and Pro-Tempore Albert Chie and members of the Senate to give significant urgency to its recommendations raise in these reports.