The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff  Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

AMID concerns about financial management at The College of The Bahamas, COB president Dr Rodney Smith has said that while he does not believe a forensic audit of COB is necessary, he would not object to having one done.

“It might have been necessary before we took certain actions, corrective actions,” he said on Friday. “I don’t think it’s necessary but I also don’t have an objection to it.”

His comment came during a wide-ranging interview with The Tribune at his office where he acknowledged “systemic” problems in COB’s past financial management and stressed that the institution will not repeat past mistakes as it transitions to a university.

However, on the key question of whether someone should be held accountable for COB’s concerning fiscal management over the years, he said no, adding that the problem was not the fault of any particular person.

His statements came after The Tribune reported that COB has failed to perform audits dating back to 2010, contravening the College of the Bahamas Act.

It also comes after an audit of COB completed this year by Baker Tilly & Gomez (BTG) for the period ending June 30, 2011 was leaked to The Tribune, shedding light on areas of weak internal controls at the institution - areas, he argued, where considerable improvements have been made this year.

Although Dr Smith said the BTG audit was helpful, he said some of its findings exist because the firm is “inexperienced” in conducting audits of higher education institutions.

“I think this might’ve been one of the first (audits) with BTG, and I commend them for being as thorough as they were,” he said. “But normally management letters of this nature are maybe one, two, maximum three, four pages as opposed to being as lengthy as this one was. And I think what’s reflected in this audit is the auditing firm tried to be as comprehensive as possible. And even some of the terms that were used were speculative terms in an attempt to try and explain some of what they might have discovered. I think it was important for the college to take it as more of a reflective assessment to help the institution move forward, which was deeply appreciated.”

On what appears to have been years of a lack of accountability and oversight at the institution, he said: “The honest answer to that is that it is historically systemic. When I say that, keep in mind, again, the circumstances surrounding the events. We live in a country where whenever we change a government we actually start all over. I think that with the University of Bahamas Bill we are trying to move into the direction of continuity so that that wouldn’t keep happening.

“Keep in mind too that whenever the government changes, instead of continuing with executive leadership or with governing leadership, the whole thing is changed and you start all over with a new set of people who don’t necessarily know what mechanisms need to be put in place to move the institution forward. So you’re going to discover that there were vacuums, for instance, where things were not done that should’ve been done but you can’t point it at individuals. It’s systemic and the systemic nature of it means that if you start over every five years, there’s going to be problems and issues from one administration that are not really being passed over to the new administration but you are letting the new administration discover these things on your own. What I call it is inconsistency in governance and inconsistency in executive leadership.”

He added: “Because of the systematic changes in leadership, I don’t think anyone was aware audits had not taken place.”

Since no financial statement of COB has been tabled in the House of Assembly in seven years, Dr Smith said the institution is working “as fast as possible” to complete its outstanding audits.

This is essential not only to bringing the institution in accordance with the law, but also to enabling the college to begin drawing down on a multi-million loan from the Caribbean Development Bank that is designed to aid its development.

“We are working as fast as possible. As a matter of fact BTG has been working around the clock and they have been very supportive of trying to move things along very rapidly,” Dr Smith said. “They have accountants here in our Business Office working with us. We are close to drawing down the funds.”

It remains unclear, however, when a University of the Bahamas Bill will make its way to Parliament.

“We just came out of a meeting with faculty members and they want us to delay it a bit because they want a little more time to review some aspects of it and we have to do what the faculty wants,” he said.

COB was expected to transition into a university in July, however that target has been missed. A new transition date has not been announced.