VALUE RELEVANCE OF PREPAYMENT AUDIT CHARACTERISTICS AND THE IMPACT ON ENHANCING THE EFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION OF WORLD BANK FUNDED PROJECT IN NIGERIA

The present study aims at investigating the value relevance of prepayment audit characteristics and the impact on enhancing the effective implementation of World Bank funded project in Nigeria. These characteristics include independence, Size, Expertise and Meetings frequency of audit project financial management team.The study seeks to analyse how auditors' qualities aid in prepayment audit and the resultant effect of the synergy on performance of public sector funded projects in Nigeria. This study adopted both an explanatory research design. The source of data was purely from secondary which used all the twenty-nine (29) ministries between 2000-2016.The statistical tools adopted parametric and non-parametric techniques of data analysis. In testing the hypotheses, Ordinary Least Square (OLS), multiple regression technique of analysis was employed, at 5% level of significance (p<0.05). There was positive and significant relationship between Audit project financial management unit Independence and ratio of completed project. There was positive and significant relationship between Audit Financial Expertise of project financial Management unit and ratio of completed project. There was positive and significant relationship between Meetings frequency of audit project financial Management unit and ratio of completed project. The paper concludes that auditors' qualities affect positively prepayment audit and this in turn affect performance of public sector funded projects in Nigeria.