Professor Kwame Adom-Frimpong, President, Institute of Chartered Accountants Ghana (ICAG) and MD, Mainstream Reinsurance Company, has reiterated that integrity is an important fundamental element in the accounting profession. Integrity requires accountants to be honest, candid and forthright with a client’s financial information.
He said Accountants should restrict themselves from personal gain or advantage using confidential information. While errors or differences in opinion regarding the applicability of accounting laws do exist, professional accountants should avoid the intentional opportunity to deceive and manipulate financial information.
“Indeed any person who wish to practice as an Accountant must have integrity and must be forthright, objective and show contentment in his life”, Prof. Adom-Frimpong explained.
He made this remarks at this year’s virtual graduation ceremony of about 250 members for the first batch of newly qualified Chartered Accountants this year at the Head office of the Institute.
“As Chartered Accountants you have to maintain professional knowledge and skills at the level required to ensure that a client / employer receives competent professional services”, he explained.
Prof. Adom-Frimpong further said the growth of electronic commerce has increased the need for greater confidence in related systems. Accountants are now required to play significant roles in building and maintaining financial systems integrated into different e-commerce platforms including consumer-to-business, business-to-business, internet and mobile technology service systems.
He said investors and managers are demanding a more time based information than just audited financial statements. These services will recognize that the time between an event and acting upon related information has become more compressed and therefore there is a need to provide guidance to practitioners to provide assurance on an entity’s continuously disclosed information.
“Accountants are now required to ensure that identification of business risk is comprehensive and that cost effective mitigations are in place to manage risk” he added.
Prof. Adom-Frimpong said companies need to ensure they adhere to good reporting standards. To ensure compliance, companies need to have the necessary accounting and reporting skills with their organisations.
“They must, therefore, employ professional accountants who belong to a professional accounting organisation (PAO), and in particular, Institute of Chartered Accountants, Ghana (ICAG) to take charge of their financial management instead of relying on charlatans and quack accountants for their financial decisions,” he said.
He urged the new graduates to avoid petty compromises and questionable shortcuts but be bold, confident and resolute to uphold the ethical principles associated with the profession.
Meanwhile, the Institute has over the years, institutionalized certain key activities, such as Continuous Professional Development programs to sharpen knowledge base, district societies to aid in networking and cohesion among members. Others include health walks, conferences and the faculty system to bring great minds with similar interests together to dialogue and contribute to national issues on wider scale.
