Statistical Analysis of the Role of Internal Audit in Promoting Good Governance in Public Institutions in Kenya

Abstract

Internal Auditing has increasingly been recognized as an integral part of modern control structures and governance practices in both the private sector and public service. It has also been adding value in organizations across all sectors for many years in order to fight against the global financial crisis and recent cases of corporate frauds that have brought into sharp focus the consequence of the precarious role to be played by the internal auditors in ensuring good corporate governance. The main objective of this study was to find out how the Risk Management, Control Process and Governance Process, which are functions of internal auditing are being recognized today at high level in many organizations, especially in public Sectors, when well structured and given the required mandate to perform, improves performance and serves as valuable contributors in Promoting good governance in its functions which are accountability, transparency, effectiveness & efficiency and responsiveness in the public institutions in Kenya. The research adopted both the descriptive and correlation research designs in order to be successful, where 370 out of 398 respondents, sampled from eighteen (18) public institutions, completed a structured questionnaire. The events were recorded; analyzed, interpreted and described by using SPSS version 20 and the specific tools that were adopted in order to identify the levels of contribution of Internal Audit in Good Governance in the public institutions, respondent responses were determined by their demographic profiles. Parametric statistics were used to derive a meaningful conclusion from the empirical data using tools like descriptive statistics, t-test and Pearson Correlation. The study concluded that there is a strong significant relationship between Internal Audit and Good Governance in Public institutions.