Tag: external audit

There are numerous other variations and forms of the above concept, but one clear common theme is that materiality represents a threshold, a gate-keeper and a clear reference to a quantum above which more discretion and judgement may be required.

Considering the high profile scandals that have dominated news headlines in the last few years, from VBS Mutual Bank to Eskom, it does not seem unreasonable to say that South Africa may have a corporate fraud problem. What’s more, the accounting irregularities that led to shareholders being defrauded and losing significant shareholder value, may have been entirely preventable if the internal auditors had been more empowered, protected and held to the same level of accountability as external auditors, via appropriate regulation of the internal audit industry.