Call to adapt standards to assure transparency in corporate governance
FE Report | Monday, 4 August 2008
Auditors and accounting professionals must adapt and comply with national and international standards and regulations aimed at assuring transparency and accountability in the corporate governance as the proposed Financial Reporting Council (FRC) is in the government's pipeline.
This was recommended at a CPE seminar on 'An Introduction to Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002' organised at ICAB auditorium in the city recently.
Chaired by former president of ICAB ASM Nayeem, the seminar was addressed, among others, by ICAB President Humayun Kabir.
ICAB member Gopal Chandra Ghosh presented the keynote paper on the topic in the seminar.
Earlier during this year's Budget Speech, Adviser for Finance and Planning AB Mirza Azizul Islam mentioned that the government was going to establish an FRC to enhance the transparency and accountability of the accountants, public interested entities, auditors and regulatory bodies like ICAB.
Modeled after the 'Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002' enacted in the USA in the aftermath of the corporate scandals of Enron and WorldCom at the turn of the millennium; the declaration of establishing the council generated mixed reactions among the auditors and business circles of the country.
Terming the proposed establishment of FRC as an important step, ICAB President Humayun Kabir said, "Corporate scandals obviously reach beyond national borders. Erosion in the investment confidence in one economy, causes the loss of confidence in the others."
"As Bangladesh has been striving to strengthen transparency and disclosure practices with a view to developing the capital market, it is agreed that that the stakeholders' confidence must be strengthened by both national and international efforts", he observed.
"While supporting the adoption of accounting and auditing standards and laws on worldwide basis, we must assure that those standards and laws are fare and just as well as applicable to our environment", he opined.
Explaining the background and summary of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002 (commonly referred as SOX or Sarbox) as well as the structure and salient points of the proposed Financial Reporting Act (FRA) and FRC, Gopal Chandra Ghosh in his keynote speech also pointed the limitations and possible consequences of the proposed act.
"With no representation of ICAB and ICMAB in permanent membership of the proposed FRC, the accountancy profession may suffer due to negligence of non-professional leaders and the ICAB may come under close scrutiny of Bureaucracy", the paper observed.
This was recommended at a CPE seminar on 'An Introduction to Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002' organised at ICAB auditorium in the city recently.
Chaired by former president of ICAB ASM Nayeem, the seminar was addressed, among others, by ICAB President Humayun Kabir.
ICAB member Gopal Chandra Ghosh presented the keynote paper on the topic in the seminar.
Earlier during this year's Budget Speech, Adviser for Finance and Planning AB Mirza Azizul Islam mentioned that the government was going to establish an FRC to enhance the transparency and accountability of the accountants, public interested entities, auditors and regulatory bodies like ICAB.
Modeled after the 'Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002' enacted in the USA in the aftermath of the corporate scandals of Enron and WorldCom at the turn of the millennium; the declaration of establishing the council generated mixed reactions among the auditors and business circles of the country.
Terming the proposed establishment of FRC as an important step, ICAB President Humayun Kabir said, "Corporate scandals obviously reach beyond national borders. Erosion in the investment confidence in one economy, causes the loss of confidence in the others."
"As Bangladesh has been striving to strengthen transparency and disclosure practices with a view to developing the capital market, it is agreed that that the stakeholders' confidence must be strengthened by both national and international efforts", he observed.
"While supporting the adoption of accounting and auditing standards and laws on worldwide basis, we must assure that those standards and laws are fare and just as well as applicable to our environment", he opined.
Explaining the background and summary of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002 (commonly referred as SOX or Sarbox) as well as the structure and salient points of the proposed Financial Reporting Act (FRA) and FRC, Gopal Chandra Ghosh in his keynote speech also pointed the limitations and possible consequences of the proposed act.
"With no representation of ICAB and ICMAB in permanent membership of the proposed FRC, the accountancy profession may suffer due to negligence of non-professional leaders and the ICAB may come under close scrutiny of Bureaucracy", the paper observed.