The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) has called for the appointment of a chartered Accountant who is also an economist to clean up the alleged rot in the nation’s federal ministry of finance.
The erstwhile finance minister, Zainab Ahmed is a member of the Association of National Accountants of Nigeria (ANAN), who played a huge role in the Finance Act and other fiscal measures which have just been reversed by the present administration owing to their adverse impact on the business environment and the economy in general.
“Today we are looking for a Minister of Finance that will clean up government monetary policy. What we need is a chartered accountant and economist. We need an economist that is a chartered accountant and not just an economist alone” states its President, Innocent Okwuosa in a statement on Sunday.
ICAN which identifies with some bold economic policy reforms of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu within the short time of assumption of office, said the administration should consider the appointment of more chartered accountants in his cabinet.
President Tinubu in his first week in office removed fuel subsidies and unified the exchange rate. He also supports a clean energy transition that factors in the vast gas resources of the country which according to ICAN, is energy justice and will reduce debt exposure of the country.
However, the body wants the President to populate his cabinet with chartered accountants owing to the socio-political challenges facing Nigeria.
“Chartered accountants should man key sensitive positions requiring proper accountability as there cannot be effective public governance without accountants,” says the body.
“The study we conducted provides evidence that shows that there is a positive correlation between having more chartered accountants within a workforce and better organisational performance. In other words, organisations that employ more chartered accountants perform better than those employing less chartered accountants in terms of service delivery and financial performance. This has been proven empirically by drawing experiences from Zenith Bank, Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS), and the Lagos State government. These three organisations span the private sector, a government agency, and state government respectively”
While the ICAN President expressed the belief that President Tinubu’s administration will experience huge performance success with the engagement of more chartered accountants, it states that within the ICAN chartered accountants, there are economists, engineers, doctors, pharmacists, architects, political scientists, and several disciplines.
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