The certificate given by Mr. FREIRE at the time he examined the accounts was as follows :—
"In accordance with your instructions, I, in conjunction with Mr. J. DA ROCHA, the Accountant of Post Office, have this day compared the annexed statements of the Money Order Department for 1888, with Books, Vouchers, &c., and certify the same to be correct."
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Ipe 22 SEP 20!
Minutes of the Executive Council
Audit Office, 10th April, 1889.
(Sigd.),
F. FREIRE,
Audit Examiner,
Amongst other items in the statement is shown a sum of $1,581.01 for unpaid orders. The vouchers to check this sum by would be the lists from the various places and the Money Order books. To enable the statement to be examined at all the vouchers must have been in Mr. FREIRE's and Mr. ROCHA's hands. I admit that with regard to these vouchers there are a very large number of alterations and erasures. If the account were examined in the Money Order Office, where it is very dark, I can imagine that the erasures might be overlooked but if the slightest attempt had been made to check the item of $1,581.01 with the vouchers it must have been at once discovered to be wrong.
As a matter of fact the amount of unpaid orders was nearer $15,000 than $1,581. There were other discrepancies in the statement which should have been discovered from the Local Ledger.
(2.) That the examinations which it was Mr. FREIRE's duty to make as Audit Clerk were generally made very much in arrear, namely, from two to four months after the transactions had taken place to which the accounts examined referred.
Mr. FREIRE denies this saying he could not examine an account before he received the Collector's account or before the account was closed.
I do not think that there was any unnecessary delay on Mr. FREIRE's part after the Collector's accounts were received; the blame that attaches to him is for not having reported to the Auditor General the late rendering of the Collector's accounts.
14th July, 1890.
HILGROVE C. NICOLLE,
Auditor.
Considered this day by the Executive Council.
Mr. Freire, 3rd Clerk of the Audit Office appears in obedience to a summons under Section 85 of the Colonial Regulations to answer the following charges preferred against him by the Hon. Lister, Postmaster General.
(a) That during the years 1888, 1889 and 1890 you performed your duties in a careless and negligent manner in that you did not ascertain whether the sums received by the Superintendent of the Money Order Office for Postal Notes were paid into the Treasury, and that you passed as correct monthly statements which...