Audit Committee Characteristics and Internal Audit Quality: Empirical Evidence From the Cameroonian Public Limited Companies

Abstract

Audit committee characteristics play a momentous role in ensuring internal audit quality. An understanding of these characteristics and their relationship with internal audit quality in public limited companies in Cameroon strengthens the audit committees and enhances internal audit quality, eventually stimulating improved governance and accountability. In this study an assessment of the relationship between the audit committee characteristics and the internal audit quality within Public Limited Companies in Cameroon was done. Data was collected from 60 Public Limited Companies operating in the Northwest, Littoral and Center regions of Cameroon. The Ordinal Least Square revealed that audit committee independence, audit committee gender, board gender andCEOduality positively influence the internal audit quality. However, the study also revealed that there is no significant effect of audit committee size, audit committee meetings, and audit committee financial expertise on the internal audit quality. This study recommends that PLCs should maintain the independence of audit committees in order to enable them carry out unbiased oversight responsibilities, and laudably uphold the integrity of financial reporting; and secondly that PLCs should uphold audit committees with gender diversity in order to benefit from diverse perspectives that lead to more informed decision making, lead to better outcomes, and contribute to the success of the company.