Uganda short of qualified accountants
Jul 24, 2007
THE Association of Chartered Certified Accountant (ACCA) Eastern African Convention will be held at the Speke Resort Munyonyo from July 25-27. David Opiokello, the Bank of Uganda deputy governor, told Ibrahim Kasita the importance of ACCA.
THE Association of Chartered Certified Accountant (ACCA) Eastern African Convention will be held at the Speke Resort Munyonyo from July 25-27. David Opiokello, the Bank of Uganda deputy governor, told Ibrahim Kasitathe importance of ACCA.
QUESTION: What does ACCA mean to you?
ANSWER: ACCA is a global accountancy body which prepares people interested in accountancy and finance to become professional accountants.
Its membership is about 115,000 worldwide with students close to 300,000 operating in 170 countries. It is more than 100 years old with the mission to provide opportunities to study accountancy and support through the professional exams up to completion.
ACCA ensures qualified accountants remain relevant through continuing professional development. I qualified in 1980 and became an associated member in 1982. I eventually became a fellow in 1987. It has helped me to enhance my career.
The central bank advertised for professional accountants in 1980 and three of us joined as the first group of professional accountants.
Two of us were ACCA members and the other was holding membership of another accountancy body. My development and growth in Bank of Uganda is to a greater extent because of ACCA. It has tremendously impacted me at personal level. I feel proud to be part of ACCA.
What role does ACCA play in the development of Uganda?
The most important role is through its members. In Uganda, ACCA has got close to 700 members with more than 3,000 students and others who qualified but waiting to become members.
As members, we are employed in different organisations as accountants, auditors, financial advisors and consultants.
One of the basic things is to ensure resources are managed in a cost-effective manner. The training is needed to manage resources effectively which is key.
As auditors, we do certify financial statements which indicate that those statements are true and fair. These statements are relied upon by various people like investors, shareholders, the Government and other people who use them to make business and investment decisions.
If our members are not qualified and do not follow professional conduct, they will not be able to certify documents with accounting or financial records the way they should and therefore reliance on such records would increasingly become a problem.
Why should young people be involved with ACCA?
The number of qualified accountants does not much the jobs available. It is estimated that about 4,000 qualified accountants would be required in different entities to do a good job compared to only about 1,000 available qualified accountants. There is a big difference between supply and demand. Any young person who wishes to become a finance person would be interested in ACCA to provide basic qualification to the profession. Since ACCA is a global the qualification, it is not restricted only to working in Uganda but in any part of the world. The qualification takes into account issues that happen globally.
ACCA is the starting point for young people who want to develop their skills in financial issues.
What are the future for ACCA in Uganda?
The future is very bright. As I mentioned earlier, there are about 300-500 students doing ACCA exams and we still have several jobs available.
ACCA regularly reviews its syllabus worldwide to make sure that business needs that will be certified by the finance people are incorporated to the syllabus. As students do exams, the changing nature of business needs brought by globalisation are taken into account.
Anyone who wants to be in touch with global development on financial issues, should embrace ACCA.
QUESTION: What does ACCA mean to you?
ANSWER: ACCA is a global accountancy body which prepares people interested in accountancy and finance to become professional accountants.
Its membership is about 115,000 worldwide with students close to 300,000 operating in 170 countries. It is more than 100 years old with the mission to provide opportunities to study accountancy and support through the professional exams up to completion.
ACCA ensures qualified accountants remain relevant through continuing professional development. I qualified in 1980 and became an associated member in 1982. I eventually became a fellow in 1987. It has helped me to enhance my career.
The central bank advertised for professional accountants in 1980 and three of us joined as the first group of professional accountants.
Two of us were ACCA members and the other was holding membership of another accountancy body. My development and growth in Bank of Uganda is to a greater extent because of ACCA. It has tremendously impacted me at personal level. I feel proud to be part of ACCA.
What role does ACCA play in the development of Uganda?
The most important role is through its members. In Uganda, ACCA has got close to 700 members with more than 3,000 students and others who qualified but waiting to become members.
As members, we are employed in different organisations as accountants, auditors, financial advisors and consultants.
One of the basic things is to ensure resources are managed in a cost-effective manner. The training is needed to manage resources effectively which is key.
As auditors, we do certify financial statements which indicate that those statements are true and fair. These statements are relied upon by various people like investors, shareholders, the Government and other people who use them to make business and investment decisions.
If our members are not qualified and do not follow professional conduct, they will not be able to certify documents with accounting or financial records the way they should and therefore reliance on such records would increasingly become a problem.
Why should young people be involved with ACCA?
The number of qualified accountants does not much the jobs available. It is estimated that about 4,000 qualified accountants would be required in different entities to do a good job compared to only about 1,000 available qualified accountants. There is a big difference between supply and demand. Any young person who wishes to become a finance person would be interested in ACCA to provide basic qualification to the profession. Since ACCA is a global the qualification, it is not restricted only to working in Uganda but in any part of the world. The qualification takes into account issues that happen globally.
ACCA is the starting point for young people who want to develop their skills in financial issues.
What are the future for ACCA in Uganda?
The future is very bright. As I mentioned earlier, there are about 300-500 students doing ACCA exams and we still have several jobs available.
ACCA regularly reviews its syllabus worldwide to make sure that business needs that will be certified by the finance people are incorporated to the syllabus. As students do exams, the changing nature of business needs brought by globalisation are taken into account.
Anyone who wants to be in touch with global development on financial issues, should embrace ACCA.