AUDIT QUALITY, CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND FIRM CHARACTERISTICS IN NIGERIA

Abstract

The major corporate collapses and related frauds which occurred in Nigeria and around the world have raised doubts about the credibility of the operating and financial reporting practices of quoted companies in Nigeria. This stirred a number of professional and regulatory organisations to recommend reforms that will improve transparency in financial reporting and thereby increase audit quality and corporate governance practices. Although evidence of corporate governance practices and audit quality exists from developed economies, very scanty studies have been conducted in Nigeria where corporate governance is just evolving. Therefore, this study provides evidence on corporate governance, audit quality, and firm related attributes from a developing country, Nigeria. Logistic regression was used in investigating the questions that were raised in the study. Findings from the study show that ownership by non-executive director has the possibility of increasing the quality of auditing. Evidence also exist that size of the company and business leverage are important factors in audit quality for companies quoted on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. The study suggests that the composition of non-executive directors as members of the board should be sustained and improved upon in order to enhance audit quality.

Keywords:   Audit quality, corporate governance, ownership structure, duality, firm characteristics