BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The term audit is derived from the word “Audire” which means to Hear. The origin of audit can be traced to the ancient days in Britain where land owners allowed tenant farmers to farm on their lands. The land owners did not involve themselves in the cultivation of the land or in the imprecision of these tenant farmers, rather cultivation of the land was done by the overseer appointed by the landowners.
Agbawe, (2005) defines audit us, “An examination and inquiry into a statement of accounts, the underlying records, documents, assets and liabilities by an independent person with a view to express an opinion us to the accuracy and correctness of the financial statement”.
However, we shall adopt the definition given by the American accounting Association Committee for our study, on Basic Auditing Concept (1971) as “a systematic process of objectively obtaining and evaluating evidence regarding ascertain the degree of correspondence between the result to interested directors, established criteria and communicating the results to the interested users.
This definition is broad and general because it encompasses both the internal and external auditing. External auditing involves the appointment of the external auditors by the board directors, which auditing involves employment of internal auditors which normally leads to creation of audit department in the organization. The audit department should relate very well with the other functional unit in the organization.
Osita Aguolu (1998) defines the internal audit as “independent appraisal of the functions and qualities of performance of an organization by a specially assigned staff as part of the internal control system”.
This definition emphasizes more on the functions and the quality of performance required in the audit department.
On the other hand, Accountability in a general sense is the liability to reveal, explain and analyse what one does, how one discharge responsibilities financially or otherwise. It provides the post modern or examination of actions, the test of obedience and judgment. It is important to note that accountability and auditing are twin brothers, after accountability comes the auditing.
In respect of the above definitions, the researchers try to find out how fair is the audit and accountability of the public sector is being maintained. Whether the rules of the audit principles are being strictly adhered to as in the public and private limited companies. This study will also focus on the various problems faced by the audit department of the delta state university library, Oleh Campus. And also highlight the roles played by the audit department.
The researchers also try to look at the public sectors whether the have qualified or experienced personnel to man the various sectors. The opinion of eminent scholars expressed in various journals related books and seminar papers were also show-cased in the study.
