‘Accountancy fails to save big companies’

Improvement in audit quality stressed.

KARACHI: Accountancy has failed to prevent the collapse of big companies in the west and there is a need to improve the quality of audit in order to meet future challenges that accountancy as a profession faces, experts say.

ICI Pakistan Chief Financial Officer Feroz Rizvi said: “Primarily, accountancy as a profession failed when it was not able to save large companies in the western world from collapse.”

He was speaking at the Accountancy Futures Symposium organised by ACCA Pakistan here on Wednesday.

His comments started a debate in a panel discussion moderated by Junaid Iqbal, CEO BMA Financials.  Partner M Yousuf Adil Saleem & Co Chartered Accountants, Nadeem Yousuf Adil, said: “I agree that auditors had failed but we need to see other companies that did well in crisis. Everybody has to take responsibility whether the management or auditors.”

ACCA Pakistan head Arif Masud Mirza said that the global economic landscape has placed professional accountants in key positions as drivers of sustainability and long-term profitability.

Hub Power Company CEO Vince Harris opened discussions on the value of audit in the modern world. “It is vital that the accountancy profession re-examines the role of audit and considers whether a sufficiently strong case is being put forward for the benefits audit can provide to businesses, economy and society,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 25^th, 2010.