Magazine No. 26 - 2021 101 Studies and other articles 1. Pandemic management No one can predict when or where pandemics might occur, but governments can always take measures to prepare for such emergencies and mitigate their impacts on society. In order to do this, governments need to establish a properly functioning Pandemic Management by developing relevant policies, strategies, and systems. This also requires coordinating the entities and activities to ensure the good governance of those emergencies. Therefore, a sound Pandemic Management consists of a combination of planning, organizing, coordinating, and implementing processes across all entities. The key element of this system is the legal and regulatory framework and infrastructure such as pandemic mitigation plans, risk assessments, and appropriate information systems. A sound Pandemic Management consists of a combination of planning, organizing, coordinating, and implementing processes across all entities Overall, COVID-19 has created a huge impact on the SAIs’ organizational, staff management systems, and their operations. In response to this, SAIs have first tried to improve and adjust their organizational strategies, systems, and tools to continue performing their tasks as well as ensure clear and secure communication channels with relevant parties. In this context, many SAIs have taken a wide range of steps from remote working models, remote access to data and documents to electronic communication with the auditees. Likewise, some of them developed a separate audit plan or pandemic action plan, while others established a business continuity management plan for ensuring the continuity of operations as well as responding to major unexpected incidents that could result in significant business disruption. TCA’s audit practice on pandemic management After the first implications of the pandemic, the primary concern for the TCA was to ensure business continuity without compromising the health and safety of staff. The aim was to maintain the performance of ongoing audit work and judicial functions. To this end, a number of measures were taken such as establishing systems with the help of IT for working from home, preparing an action plan for the continuity of trials, auditing and reporting works and training activities from distance. Aysun Celebci Principal Auditor Turkish Court of Accounts PANDEMIC MANAGEMENT, SUPREME AUDIT INSTITUTIONS (SAIs)’ ROLE IN THE PANDEMIC RISK REDUCTION, AND RESPONDING TO COVID-19: EXPERIENCE AND PRACTICES OF THE TURKISH COURT OF ACCOUNTS (TCA)
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