Preview ANAN prep

An accountant's evidence is documentary, so the paper tests whether the documents mean what the ledger assumes. The Nigerian legal system is a hierarchy a candidate must be able to recite: the Constitution as the supreme law; Acts of the National Assembly and state Laws; subsidiary legislation made under them; received English law — common law, doctrines of equity and statutes of general application — as preserved by the application laws; and customary law, applicable subject to repugnancy and public policy. Courts run from the Magistrates' and Area courts through the High Courts of a state or the FCT, the Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court, with specialist courts beside them — the Federal High Court for revenue and company matters of that kind, the National Industrial Court for employment, the Tax Appeal Tribunal for assessments, and the customary and Sharia courts of appeal in the states that operate them. Precedent means the Court of Appeal binds the High Courts below it and the Supreme Court binds everyone, which is why a practitioner's memo cites the decision rather than the feeling. Company and contract fundamentals come next, in the two acts an accountant reads weekly. A company is a separate legal person: it owns its assets, contracts in its own name, and its members' liability is limited to what remains unpaid on their shares — the corporate veil that can be lifted where the structure is a façade for improper conduct. Formation is by registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission under the Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020, with a memorandum, share capital (authorised and issued), and a secretary where required; the constitution governs the company's internal affairs; directors owe duties of good faith, of care and skill, to act within their powers and in the company's best interest, to avoid conflicts of interest, and not to use their position for personal benefit — duties owed to the COMPANY, which is why shareholders cannot simply keep what a director misapplied. Shares may be ordinary or preference; allotment, transfer and transmission are distinct; and a company's dealings with third parties turn on the authority of those who sign, which is why auditors read board resolutions. Contract is the other half: an enforceable agreement needs offer, acceptance, consideration, capacity, intention to create legal relations and legality, and it is discharged by performance, agreement, frustration or breach — with remedies in damages, specific performance where awarded, or an agreed liquidated sum that must be a genuine pre-estimate of loss. The Sale of Goods framework then supplies the implied terms a ledger depends on (title, description, quality or fitness where relied on, and fitness for purpose), and the treatment of risk and property in goods is what decides when revenue may be recognised. Finally, systems and the practice. An accountant is examined on what the records are: files and databases, backup and restore, spreadsheets for analysis, an accounting package with an audit trail that cannot be edited silently, and now the shared platforms — cloud general ledgers, an Integrated Financial Management Information System in a public entity, and data extracts the auditor takes itself. The professional obligations in a start-up or a practice are equally examinable: engagement letters, records retention, the prohibition on advertising that distorts, fees that are not contingent on an aggressive outcome, and confidentiality.

SEPARATE LEGAL PERSONALITY: the company's capacity to own, contract and be sued in its own name. ARTICLES/MEMORANDUM AND CONSTITUTION: the documents that state the company's objects and internal rules. ULTRA VIRES: an act beyond the capacity the constitution or statute allows. CONSIDERATION: something of value given for a promise; the reason the promise is enforceable. FRUSTRATION: supervening impossibility or radical change that discharges a contract. LIQUIDATED DAMAGES: a genuine pre-estimate of loss agreed in advance, as opposed to a penalty. AUDIT TRAIL: the record of who posted what, when, and on what authority.