Senior Female Professional President, Emmett Stages Glassco, has launched a scathing attack on the integrity and credibility of the Liberian Institute of Certified Public Accountants (LICPA).
Glassco is concerned about LICPA’s delay in releasing its findings from an investigation against Gedei and Associates, which audited the Liberia Football Association (LFA) for 2022, after his complaint on June 2, 2023.
“We observed a difference of US$372,412.25 (US$5,587,425.25 minus US$5,215,040.00) in the income,” Glassco stated.
“In respond to us, the LFA acknowledged and explained that the difference was a result of two figures: a loan from FIFA of US$319,045.00 and US$56,866.67, which was Orange sponsorship (cash award to teams).
“We were further informed that the loan and sponsorship was captured as part of the total cash income in the budget, while in the audited financial statements the loan was carried as borrowing, and the auditor inadvertently didn’t include the sponsorship amount as part of the total income in the audited financial statements.
“There was a difference in the expenditure of US$319,040.00 between the actual budgeted expenditure and the audited financial statement expenditure. The LFA,in their respond, agreed that this amount was the expenditure from the loan taken from FIFA.
“We wonder how come the LFA expended this huge amount and the auditor couldn’t recognize this expenditure, especially if the expenditure was carried out through the institution’s bank account. We are mostly concerned about this loan.
“The audited financial statement also shows an amount of US$697,338.00 as current liabilities. Besides the loan which we just got information about through the media from former Secretary General Isaac Montgomery, we are not aware of the rest of the amount in the current liabilities.
“We requested to know who we owed and were told by the LFA that the information was provided to the auditor and that it was the responsibility of the auditor to disclose the information to us, which they were correct as per the disclosure requirement of IFRS [International Financial Reporting Standards are a set of accounting rules for how information should be gathered and presented in financial reports].
“Sir, we intend to follow these discrepancies to the donor of the funds (FIFA), but we are hoping you will intervene before we do in making sure your member report to our institution is presented in a true and fair manner. The report has already been approved by congress,” wrote Glassco.
In response, LICPA Executive Director, Hector J. Wuor,acknowledged receipt of Glassco’s complaint.
“Kindly be informed that we have forwarded the complaint to our Ethics and Disciplinary Committee for investigation. We shall get back to you subsequently upon their response.
“Thanks for the understanding and cooperation,” Wuorwrote on June 26, 2023.”
LICPA is still investigation Gedei eight months after Glassco’s complaint, prompting him to question their integrity.
“LICPA is one of the few institutions we should be looking up to when it comes to integrity, but I have all reasons now to question their credibility.
“How long does LICPA need to look into our investigation after allegation of auditing malpractices by one of its members? How can you go audit the LFA but you fail to provide vital information?”
“So Gedei, in particular and LICPA in general, is an accomplice to the corruption taking place at the LFA.They are co-conspirators and partners-in-crime. It was good that we put them on record, and we are going to FIFA in continuation of our case. We wrote the new auditors that are currently reviewing the books of the LFA ahead of congress on 30 March,” said Glassco.