Treasury Single Account and Fraud Management in Nigeria: Benefits and Challenges

Abstract
Treasury systems are designed to manage several critical aspects of public expenditure management. Key treasury system functions include financial planning, control of the budgetary process and management of government cash flow. However, for any treasury system to be effective, government has to ensure that it has sufficient liquidity to deal with payments, while ensuring that such liquidity costs are kept within the barest minimum. TSA is a (system of) unified structure of government bank accounts enabling optimal utilization and consolidation of government cash resources. In TSA a bank account or a set of linked bank accounts is used for all government transactions all its receipts and payments and gets a consolidated view of its cash position at any given time. This study investigates Treasury Single Account (TSA) and Fraud Management: Benefits and Challenges in Nigeria. Adopting a survey design, the study made use of primary data collected mainly through administering a set of questionnaire to104employeesofselected three Corporate Affairs Commissions in South-East, Nigeria comprising Enugu, Imo and Abia.100copiesofthequestionnaireoutof the total number of retrieved copies of questionnaire were validly completed and useful for analyses. Findings interlaid revealed that: TSA significantly reduced the incidence of fraud in public enterprises; TSA in public enterprises to a large extent reduces the credit creation of deposit money banks. The study recommends that the TSA policy will be effective if, the Fiscal Sunshine Bill is to be put in place, and if enacted will open up all financial activities of government in a way that there will be no more hiding place for those who divert or loot government money. Just like the Fiscal Sunshine Act is in place with budgeting process, implementation and contract awards, should be open for Nigerians to see how both revenues are generated and how public money is being spent by those in government, and why; Government should overhaul the capacity of the Federal Ministry of Finance and the CBN in order to cope effectively with the challenges associated with enforcement of the provisions of the TSA.