What happened: During an anti-corruption review of a local partner in Burundi certain procurement irregularities were discovered. The issues concerned office supplies, car repair and IT-maintenance. Additionally, irregularities were found with regards to payment of per diem during four trainings.
What did we do: NCA had a consultant review the issues and together with the country director they were able to detect the misused and undocumented funds. The findings were reported to Norad and a repayment request of NOK 26 889 was paid.
What did we learn? The main learning issues in this case was the importance of reviewing the procurement procedures at the local partners. This should be part of the financial monitoring visits as well as an obligatory task of spot-checks. In this case these irregularities were discovered during a spot-check (Anti-corruption review) and as such reinforced the importance of this matter.